New Delhi: There is no central programme as popular as MNREGA; this was some state governments' message to the Centre as they conveyed their displeasure over the fund crunch for the scheme.
On the occasion of 10th MNREGA Divas celebrations today, these states narrated how the rural job scheme did "exceptionally well" in the insurgency-hit areas of the country particularly in the northeast and Naxal-affected districts.
The northeastern states conveyed their difficulties in convergence of MNREGA with other schemes to create durable and useful assets. "You are rich in industries... we are rich in insurgencies. You are already developed, we are not yet developed.
"So I would like to request to the minister and government of India officials that this programme, MNREGA programme has done exceptionally well," Rural Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Minister of Manipur, Francis Ngajokpa, said.
"Rest of the programmes are okay, but there is no programme as popular as MNREGA," he told Rural Development Minister Chaudhary Birender Singh and other top officials in the ministry.
Rural Development Ministers from states including Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Tripura and Uttarakhand echoed his views and narrated how the MNREGA brought changes in the lives of poor living in villages in their states.
According to a MNREGA document- 'Report to the People and Report on Capacity Building'- released by the Centre, 3.60 crore households were provided employment and 121.25 crore persondays of employment were generated in the current financial year, 2014-15 (up to December 31, 2014).
Around 95.14 lakh works were undertaken (including new works as well as spill-over works from the previous financial year), of which 29.8 per cent relate to water conservation, 30.2 per cent for provision of rural sanitation, 13.6 per cent of the works on individual land owned by SC/ST/BPL, IAY beneficiaries, small farmers or marginal farmers, 12.9 per cent rural connectivity and 5.9 per cent for land development, it says.
At the programme, Madhya Pradesh was awarded for its outstanding work in the area of convergence of schemes with MNREGA and supporting livelihoods.
