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24/11/23 11:15 AM IST

MGNREGS audit crosses 50% local bodies in just six States

In News
  • Out of the 34 States and union territories only six have completed social audit of works done under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) in more than 50% of gram panchayats.
Audit of panchayats
  • Kerala is the only State to cover 100% gram panchayats.
  • Section 17 of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) says the gram sabha “shall monitor the execution of works”.
  • Each State has social audit units which are supposed to work independent of the implementing authorities.
  • The auditing standards laid down by the Comptroller and Auditor General were issued only on December 19, 2016.
  • According to them, every Social Audit Unit is entitled to funds equivalent to 0.5% of the MGNREGA expenditure incurred by the State in the previous year.
  • The audit involves quality checks of infrastructure created under the MGNREGA, financial misappropriation in wages, and checking for any procedural deviations.
Uniform Problem
  • Other than Kerala the only States to cross the 50% mark are Bihar (64.4%), Gujarat (58.8%), Jammu and Kashmir (64.1%), Odisha (60.42%) and Uttar Pradesh (54.97%).
  • Only three States have covered 40% or more villages — Telangana (40.5%), Himachal Pradesh (45.32%) and Andhra Pradesh (49.7%).
  • Other than Telangana, among the poll-bound States, the numbers are really low — Madhya Pradesh (1.73%), Mizoram (17.5%) Chhattisgarh (25.06%), and Rajasthan (34.74%). The problem is uniform irrespective of the party in power across the country.
  • The Centre has, multiple times, reminded the States that if the social audits are not conducted regularly, then the funds under the MGNREGS will be withheld.
  • The States complain that the audit is delayed because the Centre does not release the funds for the social audit units, which work independent of the State governments, in time. There are recurrent complaints of delayed salaries for the village-level auditors.
MGNREGA
  • The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) was passed in 2005 and aimed at enhancing the livelihood security of households in rural areas.
  • Under it, the MGNREGS is a demand-driven scheme that guarantees 100 days of unskilled work per year for every rural household that wants it, covering all districts in the country except those with a 100% urban population.
  • There are currently 15.51 crore active workers enrolled under the scheme.
  • The types of projects undertaken for employment generation under MGNREGA include those related to water conservation, land development, construction, agriculture and allied works. 
Source- The Hindu

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