When farmers living on the fringes of national parks, wildlife sanctuaries and reserved forests in Assam demand the inclusion of elephant chasing as a legitimate activity under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, is there room for accommodation? That the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, despite all the visible improvements it has brought, is functioning well below its potential is widely acknowledged. Apart from operational loopholes, it suffers from oversight. And various innovative ideas have been doing the rounds advocating its widening. For instance, integrating the NREGS with rural health policy would not only involve local, village bodies in micro-level decision-making and implementation but would also ensure markedly better rural health by focusing on prevention of disease and not merely subsidised cure as has always been the bane of Indian public health policy. It would tie in with the provision of rural public goods — sanitation in particular — in a demonstrably of, by and for the villagers framework, optimally utilising allocated funds.

Part of the foundational premise of the NREGS is the fact that Central or state-level determined schemes often fail to take cognisance of local conditions, thereby failing to deliver. Expanding the scope of the NREGS — with its projects already locally determined — will be a logical extension of that premise. Take the Assam farmers: encroachment on forests meant for wildlife sanctuaries, the shrinking of habitats, the resultant destruction of standing crops, loss of human lives and dwellings by wild elephants might not plague every village. But it is the foremost daily concern for these villagers. They are already routinely engaged in chasing wild elephants. Legitimising such an activity integral to cultivation and existential safety would ensure a minimum return for their labour and crop protection.

... contd.