Union minister for rural development Dr Raghuvansh Prasad Singh has urged all the members of parliament to implement the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) in their areas on 1st April 2008 or thereafter in some gram panchayats in their areas.

In a letter to MPs, Dr Singh has aso asked them to review the preparedness of the areas with district officials to ensure that job cards are issued to every willing job-seeker, adequate awareness is generated and bank / post office accounts of wage seekers are opened.

The minister said that his ministry has notified the commencement of National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) in all the remaining 274 districts of the country from 1 April 2008 to bring rural areas in all the states and union territories within the ambit of National Rural Employment Guarantee Act.

In the new districts, efforts have to be made to ensure that there is proper planning of projects for every gram panchayat so that work can be provided whenever any demand arises.

For this, he has emphasised, the annual shelf of projects must be kept ready with administrative and technical sanction and implementation of measures for transparency and public accountability such as proper maintenance and disclosure of public records including muster rolls, job cards, measurement books, case records, employment registers, etc, must be ensured.

Social audit by the Gram Sabha of all the projects, Dr Singh said, was a vital component of the NREGA that must be undertaken meticulously. Effective grievance redressal mechanism should be established and disposal of complaints should be ensured.

He also said that vigilance and monitoring committees must be properly constituted at the village and district levels and made effective. Constant verification of works and muster rolls should be undertaken to prevent malpractices in the execution of works.

Referring to the success of rural development programmes the minister said till the end of February, 2008, his ministry had been able to invest Rs13,101.5 crore in rural areas out of which Rs8,892.45 crore have been spent on wages generating employment for 3.07 crore rural households. With this investment Rs121.64 crore person-days have been generated out of which 42.13 per cent is accounted for by women, 27 per cent by SC and 30 per cent by ST groups.

Altogether, 15.6 lakh projects have been taken up out of which 63.19 per cent are water related which enhance land productivity.

Dr. Singh said the NREG Act aims to enhance livelihood security in rural areas by providing 100 days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work.

NREGA provides a strong social safety net for the vulnerable groups by providing employment opportunity, particularly in moments when other employment alternatives may not be available to the rural households and also strengthens the natural resource base of rural livelihood by promoting measures for water conservation, drought proofing, irrigation, land development, flood protection and rural connectivity, he said.

The scheme, he said, also provided for irrigation facilities, plantations, and horticulture and land development on the lands owned by households belonging to the SC / ST groups or on the lands of beneficiaries of land reforms, Indra Avas Yojana and below poverty line families. The purpose is to create durable assets, which will help in generating sustainable livelihood and income for the rural households.