ABSTRACT
Eminent economists have dubbed MNREGS as the ‘dole’ of the UPA government. Criticism of this sort has serious implications on concept, theory and practice of development, especially in a developing country like India. In order to critically evaluate the discourse on development, its life and path is essential to discuss. It is well understood in common parlance that the practice of development has undergone an evolutionary process during the last eight and a half decades. Till the 1930s development was synonymous with economic growth, thus perceived as quantitative concept. During the 1940s and 1950s, multiple socio-economic problems cropped-up in third world countries due to economic backwardness and colonial exploitation. This forced academia to rethink the concept and formulate a new approach. As a result a ‘multidimensional approach’ has been adopted and non-growth parameters, like poverty, unemployment and inequality occupied centre stage. This evolutionary process continued in the 1970s and the issue of ‘environmental sustainability’ became an important attribute of it. During the mid-1990s, the LPG regime has significantly changed the discourse of development. Now, ‘human development approach’ has become an integral part of it which includes parameters like health, education, gender, inequality, environment and cultural capital, along with economic issues (i.e. income, credit, labour and market). The approach has been impacted by Amartya Sen’s (1989) concept of ‘capability improvement’ of the individual and community through state-market-civil society partnership. Today; economic development is identified with ‘sustained development’, which has three major components: social, economic and environmental. Thus, during last the last eight decades the concept of development has evolved from economic growth to sustainable development and approach has changed from income to capability. In this theoretical backdrop the chapter analyses the sustainability dimension of Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme widely known as MNREGS by keeping at centre stage three critical components of sustainable development: social, economic and environmental. The findings underlines that the Act brings economic sustainability by guaranteeing minimum 100 days of employment to rural households, thus ensures critical minimum economic security to the labouring poor. The issue of social sustainability is also ensured through the mandatory provisions of the Act to convene a Gram Sabha meeting at least twice a year for choice of works and site selection, social audit, crèche facility, drinking water, village vigilance committee, right to check muster rolls and unemployment allowance, medical treatment in case of injury and ex-gratia payment in case of disability or death. These measures are meant to increase people’s participation, bring transparency in the program; thereby creating social sustainability aspect of development. Finally, the act is a major source of environmental sustainability in terms of symbiotic relationship between environment and rural social structure. The Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme has tremendous potential for environmental sustainability. Major permissible works under the scheme are water conservation and harvesting, irrigation, renovation of traditional water bodies, flood control, drought proofing and rural connectivity. The main aim is to improve resource base of rural economy and thereby promote environmental sustainability aspect of development.
On the basis of these expositions one gets a rosy pictures of the program, but the scheme is not free from bottlenecks and misuse of public finance. The program has been attacked on grounds of corruption, executive apathy, quality of created assets, inclusivity, lack of awareness and so forth. These criticisms are valid to a great extent, but one should realise that the scheme is the world’s largest experiment in contemporary times in the quest for sustainable development which has tremendous potential to impact socio-economic status of labouring poor. This chapter explores the relationship between market led development, issue of social justice and potential of MNREGS within sustainable development paradigm.
