MINISTER OF RURAL DEVELOPMENT (DR. C. P. JOSHI)
(a) to (e): A statement is laid on the Table of the House.
Statement as referred to in reply to parts (a) to (e) of Lok Sabha Starred Question
No. 362 for answer on 6.12.2010
(a)&(b): Under Mahatma Gandhi NREGA, all adult members of a household can get
employment subject to an overall ceiling of 100 days of employment per household in
every financial year.
(c): All rural areas of the country have been covered under Mahatma Gandhi
NREGA. Progress of the Act is reviewed from time to time and amendments have been
made in para 1 of Schedule-I of the Act to include additional activities under the Act.
Regarding empowerment of rural women, MGNREGA in para 6 of Schedule-II
provides that priority shall be given to women in such a way that at least one-third of the
beneficiaries shall be women who have registered and requested for work under this Act.
The current share of participation by women under MGNREGA is 52% which is well
above the 1/3rd participation envisaged under the Act. In para 34 of Schedule-II, the Act
further provides that there shall be no discrimination solely on the ground of gender and
provisions of the Equal Remuneration Act, 1976 shall be complied with.
(d)&(e): MGNREGA aims at enhancing the livelihood security of the people in rural
areas by guaranteeing hundred days of wage employment in a financial year to a rural
household whose members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. Focus of the activities
permissible under the Act is on water conservation and water harvesting, drought
proofing (including afforestation and tree plantation), flood control and irrigation
facilities. Amendments have been made in para 1 of Schedule-I of the Act to include
additional activities under the Act. The two amendments made in this regard are as
under:
(i) Para 1(iv) has been substituted by the following
`Provision of irrigation facility, horticulture plantation and land development
facilities to land owned by households belonging to the Schedule Castes and
Schedule Tribes or below poverty line families or to beneficiaries of land reforms
or to the beneficiaries under the Indira Awas Yojana of Government of India or
that of the small farmers or marginal farmers as defined in the Agriculture Debt
Waiver and Debit Relief Scheme, 2008.`
(ii) Construction of Bharat Nirman Rajiv Gandhi Sewa Kendra as Village Knowledge
Resource Centre and Gram Panchayat Bhawan at Gram Panchayat level has been
included as a permissible activity in para 1 of Schedule I of the Act vide
Notification dated 11.11.2009.
All these activities contribute towards overall development in the rural areas.
