Seven months after the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) came into effect, it is being officially acknowledged that half-hearted implementation is not allowing it to change the face of rural India. The first meeting of the NREGA review council held today identified several gaps in implementation of the Act, including lack of awareness among beneficiaries and meagre provisions for administrative expenses.

Rural Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad, chairman of the Central Employment Guarantee Council, said it had to be proven to the world that the programme can be made a success. Though already there have been several benefits for the most marginalised, he admitted that the programme suffered from the same malaise as the National Food for Work programme.

The reason: it is the same over-burdened administrative machinery at the panchayat level that is implementing the NREGA. Most states have not set up a separate machinery to oversee implementation. He informed the Council that he will be writing to the Planning Commission to increase administrative expense from 2 per cent to at least 6 per cent for the programme.

The meeting was also attended by Rural Development secretary Amita Sharma, secretaries of state governments of Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Bengal; nominees of the Ministry of Women and Child Development, Agriculture, Environment and Forests, Statistics and Programme Implementation, Panchayati Raj, Tribal Affairs, Social Justice. Other members of the Council include Annie Raja, Aruna Roy, Subhasini Ali and Jean Dreze.

The Council reviews and monitors implementation of the Act, its redressal mechanisms and prepares annual reports to be laid before Parliament by the Central Government.

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