Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme or MGNREGS is supposed to help the rural folk earn substantial income by doing community infrastructure works at their habitations. South Central Railway (SCR) engineers have uniquely turned the scheme to their advantage by taking up works of mutual benefit.
Actually, the Ministry of Railways, in consultation with the Ministry for Rural Development, drew a roadmap for undertaking works and activities in convergence and six areas were identified like desilting, widening embankment, plantations and so on.
The engineering department took a step ahead to customise works as per local conditions with the help of the A.P. government in Guntur, Anantapur and Prakasam districts. In the vicinity of Ongole station, desilting of water ways of bridges, open wells, trench cutting etc. worth ₹5 crore were taken up.
“The potential of this scheme is tremendous,” said SCR General Manager Gajanan Mallya, adding that an exclusive head of railway project had been created in the main website - http://www.nrega.ap.gov.in
/Nregs
For block plantation, the maintenance period is three years with a mandatory clause of 80% survival rate. A watcher is deputed for regular watering and protecting it against cattle. Plant species were chosen in consultation with the Forest department. Trench cutting along railway boundary is to help in mitigating cattle run-over cases and also serve as rainwater harvesting pits which will benefit farmers. Works like these are in in progress in AP covering Vijayawada, Guntakal and Guntur divisions of SCR, according to chief public relations Ch. Rakesh.