Gender issues

Rural distress was growing rapidly at the time the Act was passed. The growth of agricultural production fell from 3.5 per cent in the 1980s to 2.0 per cent per annum in the 1990s (the latest edition of Economic Survey puts it at 1.1 per cent in the last fiscal year), and real income growth fell from 4.5 to 2.5 per cent per annum over the same period. By 2001, per capita foodgrain availability had fallen to lower than that in the 1950s. Workforce participation rates in rural areas declined, more for women than men. The Planning Commission reports a fall in employment growth from 2.04 per cent during 1983-94 to 0.98 per cent during 1994-2000. Even though this was accompanied by a deceleration in the rate of growth of the labour force from 2.29 per cent in 1987-94 to 1.03 per cent in 1993-2000, unemployment has grown since labour force growth outstrips the growth of employment.

These programmes have generated much needed wage employment for the unemployed and poor. However, they have suffered from the following shortcomings:

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  The allocation of funds is low, and utilization is even lower.
  

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  The number of person-days of wage employment provided per family is also very low, inadequate to help the beneficiaries to derive a sustainable livelihood and become non-poor.
  
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  Minimum wages are not paid due to high productivity norms
  
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  There are also huge delays in wage payment.
  
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  The worksites are devoid of any facilities
  
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  Village level monitoring and vigilance committees are usually not constituted in most places, which results in very little accountability and transparency
  
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  No attention has been given to capacity building of the PRI functionaries and workers at the village level. Where the works are executed by contractors, the problem of non-payment of minimum wages and delayed wage payment is even more severe.
  
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  There is a top-down bureaucratic approach and centralized character of implementation and planning
  
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  Women’s participation in planning and works has been low and their tasks at worksites are invisible, unpaid and subsumed under the overall labour process
  
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  These are supply-driven programmes
  

The Act guarantees each rural household a hundred days of manual work within a five kilometer radius on a casual basis each year. The household and those of their adult members who are willing to perform casual manual labour are required to register with the relevant authority, and to apply for work, each time specifying the period and timing of work. Though for the moment they will be paid the minimum wage fixed by the State Governments for agricultural labourers, the Centre has the power to notify wages under the Act, provided these are no lower than Rs 60. A failure to provide work within 15 days of application would require the state governments to pay an unemployment allowance to the worker, which is at least one-fourth of the wage rate for the first thirty days and not less than one-half of the wage rate for the remaining period. Some minimal worksite and welfare facilities will be provided by way of a crèche, safe drinking water, first-aid, hospitalization in case of injury, ex-gratia payment, etc. At the same time, if a worker does not show up for work after application, she will not be entitled to the unemployment allowance for the period of absence. There is also a 33 per cent preference for women.

Investments made under NREGA are expected to generate employment and purchasing power, improve the quality of life, raise economic productivity, promote women’s participation in the workforce, strengthen rural infrastructure, reduce distress migration, and regenerate natural resources.

Since this programme is demand driven it is extremely important that there be an appropriate mechanism for demand estimation. This has three components, namely, registration and application; mobilization of workers to assess demand for work; and the planning process. Since most of the works under the programme are likely to be earth works, the payment of minimum wages requires piece rate payment in a manner that is both fair and transparent, which is another very important issue.

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  Analyzing women’s access (inclusion and exclusion) to the Scheme
  
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  Assessing the State Schemes vis avis the NREGA and National Guidelines
  
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  Documenting the existing socio-economic profile and labour market conditions of female rural workers
  
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  Working with women’s organizations to assist state governments to design gender sensitive works that address both the practical and strategic gender needs that are compatible with the NREGA
  
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  Mobilizing women’s organizations to provide inputs for greater gender-sensitivity in the NREGS
  
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  Evaluating the Scheme’s flexibility in dealing with the requirements of women (esp. the elderly, the malnourished and the disabled) in location-specific and seasonal requirements
  
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  Examining the intra-family distribution of the work entitlement and designing strategies to address the emergent conflicts over women’s rights and access to work
  
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  Looking closely at the wages paid and the norms and procedures for measurement, task enumeration, piece rates and productivity norms under time rate
  
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  Identifying women’s work and specific tasks that remain invisible under piece rate
  
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  Appraising changes if any in the attitude of officials through the inculcation of an administrative ethos that can implement a gender-sensitive demand-driven scheme
  

This study was conducted on behalf of the Ministry of Rural Development with support from UNDP in over 4 selected villages in two districts each of four states of West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Orissa and Maharashtra. The districts studied are Sundergarh and Mayurbhanj in Orissa, Bankura and Medinipur in West Bengal, Villupuram and Nagipattinam in Tamil Nadu and Nanded and Nandurbar in Maharashtra.

Available information on workforce and other socio-economic aspects on these areas from the Census are presented as background to the field studies. We must state at the outset that there is a sample bias, since purposive random sampling basically picked landless/marginal farmers who are NREGS beneficiaries