Talk:National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)

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The impact of National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in Wayanad District of Kerala State in India.

The district of Wayanad is mainly agriculture oriented. The farmers cultivate Black pepper, Coffee, Areca nut, Rice etc .. all of these are labor intensive cultivations. The number of people indulging in agricultural activities are decreasing in the past years due to bad weather, fall in prices and the risk involved. The implementation of NREGA has opened the flood gates of disaster in agricultural sector. The implementation of this scheme has resulted in acute shortage of workforce in agricultural related activities. Under this scheme the labor force is being used in non productive fields such as road cleaning, leveling of roads, culvert building etc. Before the implementation of the scheme all these workers were indulged in productive agricultural activities. Now due to this scheme the agricultural works are in a crippled state. Everybody is going for the “Panchayath Work”. Nobody is available for agricultural works done in the fields of Paddy, Pepper, Coffee, Areca nut etc. As a result the productive agricultural field of Wayanad is dying very fast.

There are a lot of farmers having just two or three acres of land. They are cultivating various crops there by using the local laborers. These farmers are not big landlords or they have no other income source. They depend on the small scale farming activities to earn their livelihood. Now with the implementation of the Employment Guarantee scheme the farmers are helpless. There is no worker available for work at his agricultural fields. Some workers demand higher wages. All are going to the “Panchayath Work”

The small farmers can not afford to give higher wage rates. Even if he pays the higher rates, the workers prefer to go for the “Panchayath work” because there is only a little work to do and a lot of leisure time is available. The worker just have to go to the work site and sign the muster roll. As there is no proper supervision or targets the workers are very lazy and sits idle for long time. A hard worker and a lazy man is going to be equal there and gets the same wage. So in the process all workers become lazy, the reason : Wage is Guaranteed by the Government of India.

The rainy season in Wayanad extends from four to five months annually. In that period it is impossible to carry out any work. So the balance days in a year will only be about 105 days ( 365 days – 120 day(Rain) – 100 ( Govt Work ) – 40 ( health, leaves, festivals etc ) ). And it is heard that the 100 days of work is being increased to 150 days from next year. So there is only 50 to 60 days available in a year for doing agricultural works. There are only a few workers in a village who usually works in agricultural activities in that area. They go for work at five or six small farmers. So effectively about ten days is available for work at a farmers land. What KRISHI can be done in that time span ?

Even though there is no corruption has been reported in the scheme so far, the money is not giving the intended results. Lot of money are being spent by Wayanad people in Lottery and Liquor in recent periods. The sale of Lottery and Liquor has increased manifold in last year alone. Crores of Government money are flowing into Lottery and Liquor through the hands of workers under Job Guarantee scheme.

If this scheme is implemented in Wayanad with the objective of reviving agriculture, then it is total failure and is giving the reverse effect. Many farmers have already stopped their agriculture activities. So it is certain that with in three to five years the whole of Wayanad agriculture is going to get ruined. Thanks to extravaganza of Government through the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.97.56.192 (talk) 10:24, 29 February 2008 (UTC)