Panipat, Haryana: The rural employment guarantee scheme may be the showpiece of political manifestos and indeed championed by the UPA, but the actual implementation of the scheme is more of a challenge.
As the following report shows- operational problems are negating the objectives of the scheme.
With her ten-month-old baby, Aniket, lying wrapped up in the hot afternoon sun, Santosh digs a ditch in Simlamulana village in Panipat. The ditches will be used to store drinking water for animals.
Santosh is from Nurwala village, five kilometres away. There were originally 60 of them, all here to work under the national rural employment guarantee scheme.
Many of them had lost their jobs at textile factories and with land in Nurwala sold to real estate companies, no agricultural work was available. Yet within days 25 people had dropped out.
The villagers were desperate for work. But from day one, the sarpanch's attitude was not just difficult, it was discouraging.
There was no one to oversee their work and the sarpanch refused to mark their attendance.
"Our attendance is not noted on the job card. What other proof do we have that we did our work?" asks one villager.
The sarpanch claims it would be done on a weekly basis. But ten days were over and there were no entries in their job card.
What's worse is that portions of the land were hard and rocky. Though it took them double the time to dig here, villagers will be paid on a piece rate basis.
"The mud there is like concrete. You will understand if you use this spade just once. We women had to slowly break it," says another villager.
"If we are working hard we should get our full wages. If there is such hard surface, how will women dig it. Three or four of us are working from nine to 5.30 pm. Is it our fault that we are unable to dig this?" asks one.
"Sarpanch said that you keep working, even if you earn Rs 10," one of the workers said.
The sarpanch, and the junior engineer, who rushes to the site because of our inquiries, say villagers will be given a higher amount.
"We have typed a letter, which has been signed by the SDO and the BDO. Where 150 feet of mud was to be dug up, I have got them to accept 100 feet," said Jitender Singh, Sarpanch, Simlamulana village.
Without any assurance that they would earn the minimum wages of 140 rupees a day, people were losing heart.
Operational problems had negated the scheme's objective of relieving rural distress.