By NitiCentral Staff on April 23, 2013
NAC chief, UPA chairperson and Congress president’s pet project, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Scheme (MNREGA) was specially designed to ensure that the abject poor get to earn a bare minimum amount of money annually. This of course was also intended by the UPA as something they could use to reap huge electoral dividends. However, various reports have shown that taxpayers’ money has been used up for this scheme. Today’s CAG report on MNREGA points its finger towards shocking irregularities and immense losses amounting to Rs 13,000 crore.
Some of the highlights of the report presented by the CAG have shown the appalling misappropriation of funds and erratic functioning of the authorities that have been detected by the investigators. Not only is it inappropriate, it is also criminal on the part of the Government to mess with the hard-earned money of the honest citizen and deprive the needy of the benefits that had been assured to them.
» Analysis of data related to the performance of the scheme showed that there has been significant decline in per rural household employment generation in the last two years. The per rural household employment, declined from 54 days in 2009-10 to 43 days in 2011-12. There was also a substantial decline in the proportion of works completed in 2011-12. It was also seen that Bihar, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, which together account for 46 per cent of the rural poor, utilised only about 20 per cent of the Central Scheme funds. This indicated that the correlation between poverty levels and implementation of MGNREGA was not very high.
» As per section 16(3) of the Act, gram panchayats were required to prepare the annual development plan on the basis of recommendations of the gram sabha. In the 1,201 GPs (31 per cent of all test checked GPs) in 11 States and one Union Territory, annual plans were either not prepared, or were prepared in an incomplete manner.
» In 14 States and one Union Territory, 129.22 lakh works amounting to Rs 1,26,961.11 crore were approved in the annual plans. But only 38.65 lakh works (30 per cent of planned works) amounting to Rs 27,792.13 crore were completed during the audit period, indicating significant inefficiencies in implementation of annual plans.
» In terms of the MGNREGA, the States were to notify schemes and rules for its implementation. However, it was seen that despite passage of seven years, after the Act came into force, State Governments of Haryana, Maharashtra, Punjab, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh (five States) did not formulate rules, as of March 2012.
» Audit observed that information, Education and Communication (IEC) plans were not formulated in 12 States and two UTs. Shortfalls in utilisation of IEC funds were also noticed. In a demand-driven scheme like MGNREGS, awareness of beneficiaries and would, in turn, hamper the beneficiaries from fully realising their rights.
» Governments of four States (Arunachal Pradesh, Kerala, Manipur and Tamil Nadu) had not appointed dedicated Gram Rozgar Sahayaks. Further, persistent and widespread shortages of Gram Rozgar Sahayaks as against the requirements were noticed in the case of nine States (Assam, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand). The shortages ranged from 20 to 93 per cent.
» The Ministry relaxed all conditionalities and released a sum of Rs 1,960.45 crore in March 2011 to the States, contravening norms of financial accountability. An amount of Rs 4,072.99 crore was released by the Ministry between 2008-12 to states for use in the subsequent financial year, in contravention of budgetary provisions and General Financial Rules. Also, excess funds of Rs 2.374.86 crore were released by the Ministry to six States, either due to wrong calculation or without taking note of the balances available with the States.
» Job cards were not issued to 12,455 households in six States. Photographs on job cards represent an important control against fraud and misrepresentation. Photographs on 4.33 lakh job cards were not found pasted in seven States. Non payment/under payment of wages of Rs 36.97 crore was noticed in 14 States. There were several cases of delayed payment of wages for which no compensation was paid.
» Schedule I of the Act prescribes that the material component of the work should not exceed 40 per cent of the total work cost. In 12 States and one Union Territory, cases of the material cost exceeding the prescribed ratio were noticed. The material cost exceeded the prescribed level by Rs 1,594.37 crore in the test checked cases.
» In the test checked districts of 25 States / Union Territories, 1,02,100 inadmissible works amounting to Rs 2,252.43 crore were undertaken. These inadmissible works included construction of earthen/kutcha roads, cement concrete roads, construction of raised platforms for cattle and other animals, construction of bathing ghats, etc. Works amounting to Rs 4,070.76 crore were incomplete despite passage of significant time, rendering the expenditure unfruitful.
» In 10 States and four Union Territories, Governments had not constituted Social Audit Units to facilitate the social audit forums. In 11 States and one Union Territory, it was seen that significantly fewer social audits from prescribed norms were conducted.
» Monitoring at the Central level was unsatisfactory. The Central Council could not fulfil its statutory mandate of establishing a central evaluation and monitoring system even after six years of existence. The only monitoring activity carried out was in the form of 13 ad-hoc field visits to six states by the Council members. No follow up action was taken on these visits by the Council.
» Deficiencies, relating to both non-maintenance and incorrect maintenance of prescribed basic records, were noticed in 18 to 54 percent of the all test checked GPs, for various types of records. Widespread deficiencies in the maintenance of records restricted the process of proper verification of the outputs and outcomes of the Scheme.
» There were substantial differrences between data upload in the MIS and actual records maintained/information available with Directorate/DPC. Apart from the erroneous entries made in the database, a number of were noticed where the states were not entering data on a regular basis. Hence, the MIS data on physical and financial performance of the Scheme was not reliable. In addition, the MIS sufferred from faulty programming logic and missing validation controls. Cases of data manipulation, without any reference to basic records and without any apparent basis, were noticed.
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