30
S
tate
of
I
ndia
’
s
L
ivelihoods
R
eport
2015
activities under MGNREGA. I have made
an initial allocation of
`
34,699 crores
2
for
the programme”. The budget allocation in
2015–16 is marginally higher than the allo-
cations made in 2014–15 at
`
339.89 billion.
3
During 2014–15,
`
248.39 billion were
paid out as wages to about 62.2 million
persons from 41.4 million households
(Table 3.1). Eighteen per cent of the house-
holds were able to earn more than
`
10,000
during the year from NREGS.
4
But 56
per cent households had received less than
`
5,000 during the year. The average wage
received by an individual worker was about
`
6,000. These numbers quite clearly bring out
that NREGS wages played a critical role in at
least 44 per cent of participating households
with life-sustaining incomes. The scheme,
at the same time, seems to suffer from inef-
ficiencies in some states. The share of wages
paid is at 67 per cent of total expenditure
at the country level; roughly 2 out of every
3 rupees spent on the scheme reaches the
workers. But in some states such as Bihar
(46 per cent), Gujarat (57 per cent) and
Karnataka (58 per cent), a higher propor-
tion is spent on material and administration
components. States such as Kerala, Tripura
and Tamil Nadu havemanaged to keep other
expenditures very low and managed to uti-
lise 92 per cent, 84 per cent and 79 per cent
respectively of their funds towards wages.
The outcome from deployment of such
a large number of people in wage labour
has been an area of considerable debate.
While a number of projects in irrigation,
agriculture-related infrastructure, roads and
community infrastructure have been taken
up, completion of work has been slowing
down over the years (Figure 3.1). The last
two years in particular have seen a drastic
decline with 60 per cent and 40 per cent of
the work reported as completed compared
to 94 per cent works completed in 2009–10.
Whether this decline in completion rates is
on account of large public works that can
be completed over a longer period of time
is not clear.
Different types of economic, social and
welfare infrastructure have been taken up as
part of the NREGS works (Table 3.2). Road
connectivity projects have been prioritised
followed by water harvesting and soil and
water conservation and renovation of tradi-
tional water bodies. Water has been a major
theme in NREGS with drought proofing
category of works also concentrating mostly
on water conservation.
Many works taken up have been of a tem-
porary nature that have to be redone again
Table 3.1:
NREGS: A snapshot (2014–15)
Number of persons registered
275.7 million
Number of active workers
91.5 million
Revised budget 2014–15
`
330.00 billion
Budget for 2015–16
`
346.99 billion
Number of persons demanding work
73.1 million
Number of persons allocated work
72.9 million
Number of persons who took up work
62.2 million
Number of person days of work provided
1662.7 million
Average number of days worked per household
36
Number of households gaining 100 days work (% to total)
2.49 million (5.4%)
Wages paid to workers
`
248.39 billion
Average income per household
`
6,000
Source:
NREGS MIS, MoRD, GoI.
2
While there is a marginal increase in the budget
allocation, over the years the budgets have not factored
in the increased minimumwages. As a result even with
higher allocations, only a lesser number of days of work
can be offered.
3
Even as this chapter was being drafted, the GoI
had announced additional 50 days of extra work per
household during 2015–16 in drought affected areas.
4
See annexure at the end of the chapter for more
state-wise details.
Figure 3.1:
NREGS falling work completion
rates (%)
Source:
NREGS MIS sourced from MoRD website.
94.5 92
86.6
75.7
60.6
40.6
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
2009
–10
2010
–11
2011
–12
2012
–13
2013
–14
2014
–15
