Pre-election year sees big jump in rural employment spending

The revised estimate for expenditure on the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) is likely to be 40-47 per cent higher than the budgeted amount of Rs 60,000 crore for fiscal 2023-24, government sources have told Business Today TV.

An additional Rs 16,143 crore was allocated for the flagship rural employment scheme in December. Sources said that an additional Rs 10-12,000 crore is likely to be spent, bringing the total outlay to nearly Rs 88,000 crore till March 31 this year.

The government has consistently raised concerns about fund misappropriation in certain states over the years regarding this demand-driven scheme. This concern led them to provide only Rs 60,000 crore in the current budget, a five-year low for the scheme.

MGNREGS aims to provide at least 100 days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household in rural areas of the country whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work.

The additional outlay of up to Rs 26,000 crore does not impact the fiscal deficit due to higher tax revenues and non-tax revenues expected by the government in FY24. Additionally, there would be savings in many schemes, as several departments are unlikely to fully spend the funds allocated to them for the current fiscal year.

According to official data, 250.21 crore person-days of work have been generated, with Tamil Nadu leading with 38.29 crore person-days of work and Uttar Pradesh following closely with almost 22.95 crore person-days of work.

Earlier, the Department of Expenditure of the Ministry of Finance had said it is actively seeking to plug leakages to maintain a fair and transparent working of the scheme and to eliminate dubious or fake beneficiaries. Some announcements are likely in this regard in the interim Budget scheduled to be presented in Parliament on February 1.

Starting January 1, 2024, the government has made the Aadhaar-Based Payment System (ABPS) mandatory for wage payments. Under the ABPS, a worker's Aadhaar is linked with her MGNREGS job card and bank account.

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