The Budget allocation for the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Program (MGNREGP) scheme was cut by 25 percent in the Union Budget which was presented to the Parliament yesterday.

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Under the 2022-23 Budget, which was presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, the allocated expenditure to the MGNREGP has been reduced by 25.2 percent to Rs 73,000 crore; Rs 98,000 crore were allocated under the revised estimate for the program in the previous budget.

The program provides guaranteed 100 days of wage employment in every financial year to each rural household where an adult member engages in manual labour. The scheme was introduced in 2005 through the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. The scheme, which earmarks at least one-third of jobs for women, has emerged as an important safety net for poor and migrant workers in rural communities.

The scheme has been lauded by the likes of the World Bank for its contributions to rural development and over the past couple of years has remained the essential safety net for many rural workers who have been disproportionately been affected by the pandemic.

The Economic Survey 2022-23 itself highlighted that the demand for the scheme remained higher than pre-pandemic levels, indicative of the fact that many millions still are relying on the program to sustain themselves. Despite this, the scheme found no mention in Sitharaman’s 90-minute speech nor was its budget increased. With an allocation of Rs 73,000 crore, it is much lower than the actual expenditure of Rs 1,11,170 crore during 2020-21.

Sitharaman’s Budget speech has promised “Amrit Kal” for farmers, and in terms of budget allocation this mainly seems to be through various development schemes.

The Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM)/National Rural Drinking Water Mission saw an increase of almost Rs 15,000 crore to a total of Rs 60,000 in the current fiscal. The allocation made to the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojna was also increased by Rs 5,000 crore compared to Budget 2021-22’s revised estimate.

The Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchan Yojana saw a marginal increase of Rs 248 crore in allocation and the Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin) also saw a slight increase over previous fiscal’s revised estimates to Rs 7,192 crore.

The Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana was allocated Rs 900 crore, an increase of Rs 109 crore from the revised estimate in the previous budget. The funding for the PM-KISAN scheme and livestock health and disease control programmes were increased while urea subsidies and farmers’ crop insurance schemes saw a reduction in funds allocated.

On the whole the amount dedicated for rural development was marginally lower than last year’s revised estimate of Rs 206,948 crore. The amount allocated towards rural development in Budget 2022-23 is Rs 206,293 crore, and the Ministry of Rural Development has been allocated Rs 138,203 crore.

But the Budget also the saw mention of introduction of new schemes to boost rural development like acceleration of delivery for digital and hi-tech services to farmers, use of drones for crop assessment, chemical-free natural farming in a 5-km corridor along rivers in the Gangetic plains, expansion of PM eVIDYA classes, onboarding of all post offices in the banking system, and delivery of optical fibres to rural areas.

(Edited by : Aditi Gautam)