Plug leakages

Malpractices under MGNREGA must be addressed

Prima facie, it is hard to find fault with the government’s order to make all payments to the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) beneficiaries via Aadhaar-linked bank accounts and also to record the presence of the workers through the mobile phone application-based attendance system. These measures are meant, evidently, to ensure that the payments go to the genuine workers, diminishing the scope for misappropriation of funds through fraudulent means like fake enrolment of workers. However, the fact that can also not be disregarded is this move can cause some inconvenience to those whose bank accounts are not seeded with Aadhaar. This is why some civil right activists and MGNREGA workers are contesting this rule. Going by their reckoning, 57 per cent MGNREGA job-card holders would become ineligible to receive their wages.

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