Get more landless labourers enrolled for Bharosa, say agricultural workers bodies

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Get more landless labourers enrolled for Bharosa, say agricultural workers bodies

Hyderabad: With the government undertaking a massive exercise of holding gram sabhas to identify beneficiaries before the launch of the Indiramma Atmiya Bharosa Scheme, organisations working on the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) call for a change in the base year for identifying the workers who can avail it. They want 2021-22 to be used as the base year instead of 2023-24. Under this scheme, 5,79,452 families of landless labourers are set to receive Rs.12,000 per year.Explaining the rationale for their demand, Chakradhar Buddha, who was associated with LibTech India, said, “We recommend using data from 2021-22 instead, as it recorded the highest MGNREGA person-days in the past four years during a period of heightened rural economic distress. Many migrant workers who returned to villages during the Covid-19 pandemic were from economically vulnerable households, including landless agricultural labourers, and often engaged in seasonal agricultural work — a livelihood severely disrupted during the pandemic.”The increased reliance on MGNREGA during this time highlights the vulnerability of landless households. About 29 lakh households and 48.8 lakh workers participated in MGNREGA in 2021-22, compared to 25.3 lakh households and 40.6 lakh workers in 2023-24, showing a 12.8 per cent decrease in household participation and a 16.8 per cent decline in worker participation. Using 2021-22 as the baseline ensures better coverage of economically vulnerable landless households, he added.The organisations such as LibTech India and the Dalit Bahujan Front represented by P. Shankar, written to panchayat raj and rural development minister D. Seethakka appreciating the Telangana government’s initiative to support landless agricultural labourers through the scheme.The letter, however, also sought to bring attention to the issue of deletion of 4.4 lakh job cards and 15.8 lakh workers were deleted from MGNREGA database in 2022-23. This. it said. makes a compelling case for considering data from 2021-22, which reflects a more accurate picture of landless labor households. Relying on 2023-24 data as the base for eligibility, the government is excluding genuine workers and households who were wrongly deleted in 2022-23.The organisations also raised concerns about the Aadhaar-Based Payment System (ABPS), which is increasingly being pushed for direct benefit transfers under MGNREGA. Chakradhar Buddha explained, “ABPS requires bank accounts to be linked with Aadhaar and mapped to the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), which processes all transactions. However, many workers face hurdles due to the additional burden on overworked rural bank branches and a lack of clarity among bank officials about the mapping process.”He emphasised the importance of offering beneficiaries a choice between ABPS and traditional account-based payment systems. “As of January 21, 2025, MGNREGA data shows that 34 per cent of workers in Telangana are still ineligible for ABPS, which underscores the need for a dual payment system. This is particularly critical in Adivasi areas with limited banking infrastructure,” he said, suggesting alternative cash distribution mechanisms like gram sabhas in such regions.They also want the scheme to be extended to project-displaced people, such as those displaced by the Mallanna Sagar Project. These individuals should also be exempted from the 20 days MGNREGA work participation rule to account for their unique vulnerabilities and ensure equitable inclusion. Of the 48 lakh job cards in the state which have enrolled 92 lakh workers in the state akin to all state government schemes which consider family as a unit around 25 lakh job cards are considered active. Of them around 17,25,000 families have been identified as those who have worked for at least 20 days as per norm. Of these 11,44,000 families own land or hold ROFR (Record of Forest Rights) patta.



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