The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Kerala seeks changes in NREGP norms

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Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Kerala seeks changes in NREGP norms

Special Correspondent

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Kerala has sought a revamp of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (NREGP) norms to suit the specific conditions prevailing in the State.

Minister for Local Self-Government Paloli Mohammed Kutty told the Assembly in response to a calling attention motion from C.K.P. Padmanabhan (CPI-M) on Wednesday that many of the norms of the scheme were not relevant to Kerala’s physical conditions and needed to be amended. The State government, he said, had written to the Centre seeking inclusion of agricultural activities, construction of houses, manufacture of smokeless ‘chulhas’ and construction of garbage pits and soak pits as some of the activities that could be taken up under the NREGP.

The State government also proposes to prepare a calendar of agricultural activities so as to ensure that sufficient number of farm labour was available during sowing and harvest seasons even when the NREGP was under implementation.

Earlier, Mr. Padmanabhan pointed out that the norms of the NREGP carried little relevance in Kerala . In Kerala, the need was to have more hands to do agriculture-related activities and this would be possible only if there were significant changes in the norms, he said.

Work on 239 roads had begun following completion of the contract procedures. Work on the remaining roads would be taken up when funds become available from the State exchequer to bridge the gap between Central allocation and the estimated cost of the work, he said.

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