Nearly 5,000 workers from multiple states have sent postcards to Prime Minister Narendra Modi protesting the suspension of work under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in Bengal for two years and a half.
They have donated one rupee each to the Centre, ostensibly to help it towards arranging the funds so the scheme can resume in Bengal.
“If the Centre cannot release the NREGA budget for Bengal, we, the workers of India, will raise the money ourselves. We demand that NREGA work in Bengal be resumed immediately,” the workers wrote to Modi as part of a campaign by the NREGA Sangharsh Morcha (NSM).
The rural development ministry stopped releasing funds to Bengal since December 2021 citing irregularities in the implementation of the programme, which provides up to 100 days’ employment a year to every rural household in India.
Since the start of the financial year 2022-23, therefore, no work under the scheme has been undertaken in Bengal, and the state government has been forced to clear the wage arrears with its own money. Many job card holders have been forced to migrate to other states in search of work.
Every state and Union Territory except Bengal has been receiving central funds to implement the job scheme.
Over 2,500 workers from Gujarat associated with the Anna Suraksha Adhikar Abhiyan have sent the postcards, along with 800-plus workers from Bihar associated with the Jan Jagran Shakti Sangathan (JJSS). The NSM, an umbrella body, coordinated the effort.
Ashis Ranjan from the JJSS said the workers had sent the one-rupee donation by money order. “It’s a symbolic protest as the government keeps cutting funds for the scheme,” he said.
On Monday, nearly 100 MGNREGA workers led by the Paschim Banga Khet Mazdoor Samity — a body of farm labourers in Bengal — gathered at the state BJP headquarters in Calcutta for a gherao.
On September 29, MGNREGA workers from Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Bengal, Bihar and Odisha will congregate in Ranchi to stage a protest,
Ranjan said.
On August 5, a delegation of 15 from various workers’ unions met Union rural development secretary Shailesh Kumar Singh and demanded the resumption of work under the scheme in Bengal.
It expressed concern about a lack of credible investigation into the alleged irregularities that led to the stoppage of funds to Bengal. Nobody has been held accountable for the alleged irregularities yet.
In April this year, Calcutta High Court formed a four-member committee to verify the authenticity of the MGNREGA work conducted in Bengal.
In a media statement, the NSM said that while the court’s decision to investigate the matter was welcome, such processes should not come at the expense of the millions of workers who are being unfairly deprived of their right
to work.
Purvayan Chakraborty, a lawyer representing the Paschim Banga Khet Mazdoor Samity in court, said the Union ministry had not revealed who the people behind the alleged irregularities were or what action was being taken against them.
“It’s unfair to suspend the scheme citing irregularities. We are challenging the stalemate in the implementation of the scheme in the name of irregularities,” he said.
Over the past year, chief minister Mamata Banerjee has met Modi twice on the issue of his government’s stoppage of funds to Bengal under the MGNREGA and the PM Awas Yojana Grameen (rural housing) schemes.
Two rounds of discussions between senior officials of the state and the Centre have been held. However, no progress has been made, the state government has complained.
