The Hindu : Front Page : Extend rural job guarantee scheme: Rahul

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Thursday, Sep 27, 2007
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Extend rural job guarantee scheme: Rahul

Special Correspondent

— Photo: PTI/Vijay Kumar Joshi

new initiative: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh with the newly elected AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi and others in New Delhi on Wednesday.

NEW DELHI: Barely a day after assuming office, the newly appointed Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi was part of a delegation of office bearers that met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday and urged him to extend the National Rural Employment Employment Guarantee Scheme to all the 600 districts of the country. The scheme that provides 100 days of employment to the rural poor is at present being implemented in 330 districts.

The Prime Minister is understood to have assured the delegation that he would give serious consideration to their request. He is reported to have said that a decision in the matter would be taken “shortly.” Sources, however, said that the matter is already under consideration and was to be announced in the budget session of Parliament as it entailed allocation of funds.

Claiming that the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act was a landmark legislation of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government, the new team of Congress general secretaries pointed out that it was also one of the important promises in the Congress manifesto and a key element of the National Common Minimum Programme.

In a memorandum submitted to the Prime Minister, the delegation said that the Act represented a paradigm shift in that it provides assured employment for 100 days to a rural household. “The key to this legislation is the word ‘guarantee’ which makes employment a right — something that people can expect, demand and enforce. It not only enhances the income of the rural poor in the short-term but also creates durable assets through the process of employment; it generates the much-needed productive infrastructure for poverty alleviation on a sustained basis. To that extent it provides a safety net to the rural poor.”

“The programme is already achieving a significant impact in terms of providing livelihood security to the rural poor. The flagship programme in its first phase was under implementation in 200 identified backward districts. As mentioned in the Act, the NREGA is to be extended to cover the rest of the country in subsequent phases,” the delegation said in its memorandum. They said it would reinforce the government’s commitment to eradicating poverty and be widely welcomed as an important welfare measure.

The Congress delegation comprised Rahul Gandhi, Veerappa Moily, Ashok Gehlot, Janardan Dwivedi, Kishore Chandra Deo, Mukul Wasnik, Margaret Alva, Prithviraj Chavan, V. Narayanasamy, Satyavrat Chaturvedi and V. Arun Kumar.

This is not the first time that the Congress has taken up issues of popular interest with the government. In the past party president Sonia Gandhi has raised the issue of oil price rise, rise in the prices of essential commodities, free trade agreements, dilution of the Right to Information and recently, the controversial affidavit filed in the Supreme Court on the Ramar Sethu project.

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