Question : LATE PAYMENT OF WAGES

(a) whether the Government has taken note of the reported delay in payment of wages to the workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in various States;

(b) if so, the details thereof;

(c) the number of such cases reported and the number of workers affected in various States during each of the last three years and the current year, State-wise;

(d) the corrective action taken by the Government in this regard; and

(e) the steps taken by the Government to ensure timely payment of wages to workers under the scheme?    

MINISTER OF RURAL DEVELOPMENT (SHRI JAIRAM RAMESH)     (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. 83 for answer on 16.08.2012

  (a): Yes Sir. The Government is aware of delays that occur in disbursement of wages to workers under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and this has been identified as a major challenge facing the implementation of the Act.  

(b) & (c): The Ministry receives a large number of complaints of all types about implementation of MGNREGA in the country. 48 cases related to delayed payment of wages have been received in the Ministry as on 31.3.2012 since inception. The State-wise details of such cases are given in Annexure. Information regarding number of persons whose wages are delayed is not maintained separately. As implementation of the Act is done by the State Governments in accordance with the Schemes formulated by them as per the provisions of the Act, all such complaints/cases received in the Ministry are forwarded to the concerned State Governments for taking appropriate action as per law.

  (d) & (e): The steps taken to reduce such delays include the following:  

  (i) Keeping in view the challenges in implementation in MGNREGA including the problem of delay in payment of wages, permissible administrative expenditure limit was enhanced from 4% to 6% for deployment of dedicated staff for MGNREGA, strengthening management and administrative support structures for social audit, grievance redressal and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) infrastructure.

(ii) Use of information technology to automate the manual processes is being promoted.

(iii) Payment of wages in cash has been allowed in IAP districts where outreach of Banks/Post Offices is inadequate as an interim arrangement subject to certain conditions.

(iv) To strengthen the institutional outreach for wage disbursement, it has been decided that State Governments should roll out the Business Correspondent Model to make wage payment through Banks with Bio-metric authentication at village level.

(v) States have been instructed to establish State Employment Guarantee Funds for greater flexibility in management of funds for MGNREGA.

(vi) Various advisories have been issued to States/UTs to check delays in payments. A time schedule for payment of wages has been suggested to the States/UTs to reduce administrative delays.