ABSTRACT
This chapter evaluates the contribution of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) to employment creation, social inclusion, and skill development. It examines the extent to which MGNREGS has led to social inclusion and the empowerment of women. The chapter considers how skill training could contribute to more productive and longer-term benefits for the beneficiaries of the scheme. Skills could be disseminated more systematically to the beneficiaries of MGNREGS through formal training programmes. While there are many different dimensions to the concept of empowerment, in relation to MGNREGS it can be observed at three levels: personal, social and economic. The wages of males and females employed under MGNREGS are equal and of the total beneficiaries at least one-third should be women. In contrast to the detractors of MGNREGS, the scheme's supporters argue that it has generated much needed employment and benefited large sections of the marginalised population in rural India.
