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By Aparna Pallavi
The villagers of Maharashtra know the potential for corruption, delay and denial of entitlements in the government's employment guarantee schemes. Nevertheless, in Bhandara district, villagers are eagerly awaiting the Rural Employment Guarantee of 100 days of work. It's either that or migration to the city, they say
“You want to know who wants work?”asks Ramchandra Bawane, “Just let the work start and you won’t find a single adult in the village who is not queuing up for it.” Bawane is the upasarpanch of Dawwa gat gram panchayat in Bhandara district of Maharashtra. There are 410 families in the three villages which come under this gat gram panchayat, the two others being Garada and Gangalwada. In this village, as in any other village in Vidarbha at this time of the year, agricultural work is nearly over. “The only work left is the madai (husking) of paddy and the harvesting of lakhodi (a lentil),” says panchayat member Anita Jagnade. “If it had not been for the bumper rice crop this year, this work too would have been over by now.”
Asked what the people plan to do once the work is over, resident Namdeo Nimbarte says, “What will we do? Unless we can get work under Rojgaar Hami (Employment Guarantee), we will have to start thinking about going to the city.”
The reasons for this desperation are obvious. Out of the 410 families under this panchayat, 360 own land, but 70% of them own 1 acre or less. Of the remaining 50-odd families, 35 are encroachers on forest land, cultivating less than 5 acres of land. The remaining 15 or so families are landless. Apart from agriculture, the only other source of livelihood in the village is minor forest produce collection. This latter source is also petering out due to rapid degeneration of forests near the village.
Some 900 adults from 317 families in this village applied for registration under the newly-launched National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. Three hundred and five of the families have also been registered. But there is no sign of work.
“We have sent a demand in January for six works of road-building and tank-deepening,” says Bawane with cool detachment, “The officials say the work will start from March 1. Maybe it will start after March 15.”
The situation is not very different in the other villages in the area. In Tekepar (Madgi), in the same district, 90% of the 209 families are marginal farmers, while some 10 families are landless. With agricultural work coming to an end, families are preparing to migrate.
Yes, every adult in the village has filled up the Employment Guarantee Act (EGA) form. Some 100 people have also got their EGA identity cards. But where is the work? “We need work desperately,” says panchayat member Kaushalya Chetule, “The people here have very little land, and there is a perpetual water crisis. Very few people who own wells can take a second crop after rice.” But again, there is no rancour about the work not having begun (officially, the process of work distribution to panchayats should have begun after February 20). Says Sitabai Shende, president of the federation of self-help groups in the village, “The officials said March 1. Let us see when it actually begins.”
The 100-odd families living in the village of Navi Arjuni lost most of their land to the Gosekhurd dam. The situation of this village is precarious, because their lands have not yet been taken over by the government. “At present we are still cultivating our land,” says elderly Gangaram Gadhave, “but once the project is complete, 50% of the families will be landless, while the rest will not have more than an acre or so of land left.”
By way of compensation, a few months ago the villagers were given Rs 40,000 per acre. “That is a pittance,” says Bahurao Morghade, “The prevailing rate is Rs 1.35 lakh per acre.”
While all adults in the village (around 350) have filed for EGA registration, only 100 cards have arrived. The date of starting work has not been decided yet.
The newly-introduced Employment Guarantee Scheme has predictably not created much of a sensation in these villages, as they have already lived with the Maharashtra State Employment Guarantee Scheme earlier. Many don’t even know that a new act has been launched. But the villagers are certainly intrigued by the new panchayat-level system of registration.
“It is certainly better that we can register right in the village,” says Sakharam Nimbarte of Dawwa. “Earlier we had to make many trips all the way to Bhandara to get registration. Even then nothing was sure. Now it is our own people doing the registration work.” Adds Gadhave, “Earlier there used to be agents for registration. We had to pay Rs 20 or 30 just to get our names registered. This system is good.”
The people are also happy about the 18-year age criterion. “Earlier people would fight with each other to get their children registered,” says Sitabai. “Now there is no reason to fight -- everyone above 18 can register, no one under 18 can.”
But when it comes to the moot question of work and wages, the people’s enthusiasm wanes. Dark memories of earlier experiences take over. “For work done in March, we would get coupons in May and the actual grain in July or August,” says Anita Jagnade.
There are also references to corruption in wage distribution. Says Mangala Gadhave of Arjuni village, “The thekedars (contractors) would not pay us on time, and later they would offer us lesser amounts. By then we would be financially too weak to resist.”
Will the new system be different in this area, they want to know. “I have heard that the payments will be made through the bank, and there will be no corruption,” says Bisan Parteki of Arjuni. “Tell me, is that true?” When told that this scribe has heard of no such proposal, he smiles a disappointed smile, “Then there is nothing much to look forward to.”
There are apprehensions about the nature of work allotment and wage distribution. “We had been told that the government rate is a minimum Rs 60 per day,” says Kewalram Nimbarte of Dawwa, “but now we are being told that wages will be according to work done. If this is true, corruption is sure to be there.”
Bawane has other objections, “There is no provision for skilled work, though there are many skilled masons in our village.”
Many objections are raised regarding the clause about 100 days of work to one adult per family. “It is too little,” says Gowardhan Chetule of Tekepar. “As if low and unsure wages were not enough, this clause only adds to our problems. Every adult in the village needs work every day. Why this kind of limitation?”
“And the work distribution will also not be fair, you will see,” declares Sopan Morghade. “We have seen earlier, officials would give more work to people they like – they were even given better wages.”
According to Praveen Mahajan, sub-divisional magistrate, Bhandara, the process of issuing family identification cards is being hampered by the fact that the signatures of all the family members are required on the card. “In most cases all the members do not turn up to sign the card at one time, which delays the process of issuing cards,” says he.
Regarding the delay in starting work under the scheme, Mahajan says that the ‘peak’ time has not arrived yet, though applications for work have begun to arrive. “In Bhandara district, the demand for EGS work does not start in full swing till mid-March,” said he. “Once there are a sufficient number of applications from a given village, work is started there.”
“You have come at the wrong time, bai,” says Bawane with a grin, “You come back here when the work starts, and then you will get to see some real tamasha.”
(Aparna Pallavi is a Nagpur-based freelance journalist.)
InfoChange News & Features, March 2006
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