Samir Prasad, PACS Programme communications resource person, reports from Patna:

"We have heard about the NREGA. It provides employment, but we do not know anything more," said Indel Manjhi of Tarokhar village, Raitor panchayat in Bihar's Nalanda district.

He was speaking at a meeting conducted as part of NREGS Campaign 2008, initiated by the Management Consultants of the PACS Programme in consultation with DFID-India (to read about NREGS Campaign 2008 , click here).

The meetings in Bihar covered 250 villages across 24 districts and aimed to increase awareness among the poorest communities about the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) and to make the local administration realise its weaknesses in implementing the scheme.

Exploiting people's ignorance

Indel Manjhi's ignorance about his entitlements under the NREGA is shared by most dalit families in the village. He does not have land and works as a labourer for four or five months in the year. He is paid in kind -- two or three kilos of rice. People like him would benefit greatly from the NREGS if it were properly implemented. But he does not even have a job card.

Pushpa Devi, from a nearby village in the same panchayat, is lucky to have a job card and recalls that she was employed for 15 days and paid Rs 60 per day, though the stipulated minimum wage in Bihar is Rs 86, according to government circular No 7092, dated May 23, 2008. Her job card, however, was incomplete and did not carry her photograph.

The mukhiya of Raitor panchayat, when questioned at the meeting about such anomalies, replied that people received less payment because they did less work than the standard laid down by the government. He promised that Pushpa Devi's job card would be filled in properly, but refused to answer any more questions.

About 250 km away, in Choti Sasaram panchayat, Bhojpur district, the situation was much the same. At the NREGA meeting, in a dalit tola, participants who were asked whether they had job cards were so poorly informed that they mistook this to mean BPL (below the poverty line) cards.

Some did have job cards and had been employed for six or seven days. Others, like Babita Devi, had a job card but had not got any work.

The mukhiya, Radha Devi, while avoiding straight questions, said she had provided over 800 job cards in the panchayat. "Five different schemes worth Rs 15 lakh have been undertaken in the last financial year, employing 120 people for 25 days. In no other panchayat has so much work been undertaken," she claimed.

A similar picture emerged in all panchayats covered under the NREGS campaign: most families in dalit tolas or hamlets did not have job cards and knew very little about the NREGA.

Those who had job cards and were employed for a few days were still unaware of the schemes benefits. Moreover, job cards are often taken away by panchayat functionaries ostensibly to fill in data; most show an incorrect number of work days and payment.

Says Swapan Dey of the PACS Programme CSO Kanchan Sewa Ashram, Muzaffarpur:"Corruption is rampant among panchayat functionaries. They ask for money to issue job cards, fix pictures on job cards, etc. Many job cards have been made for those who do not need them, while the work is being done by others."

Official apathy and subversion

More importantly, the villagers said that finding NREGS work was more troublesome than finding other work in the village. According to the PACS Programme CSO Nav Bihar Samaj Kalyan Pratishthan Kendra (NBSKPK), Nalanda, deliberate delays and hassles created by panchayat functionaries and the local administration cause people to lose interest in the NREGS and take up other work even if it paid less.

This is an important reason why, in spite of intensive awareness campaigns launched by civil society organisations, both awareness and eagerness to get NREGS work remain low in Bihar.

The local administration does little to popularise the scheme. The mukhiya of Raitor panchayat said:"We can provide only as many job cards as we can handle. How can we provide work to everyone?"

The state's rural development department (RDD) has recruited the required technical staff, but Hareram Pandey from the PACS Programme CSO Institute of Homeo Care and Research (IHCR) in Bhojpur, observed that there was very little coordination between them.

Training and orientation programmes have been conducted for all NREGA staff but there is no follow up or systematic stages of training.

Low wages are another problem."We get Rs 2,000 per month, which is less than the daily wage if calculated per day. How much do you expect from us," asks Valmiki Kumar, the newly recruited rozgar sevak from Nalanda.

Impressive initiatives only on paper

The rural development department has embarked on a series of extremely impressive initiatives: issuing regular guidelines, recruiting all staff and training them, assigning SGSY groups to create awareness, and ensuring that compulsory gram sabhas on the NREGA are held every month ( see related interview). Yet this does not translate into action on the ground because the local administration has not imbibed the essence of it. Instead, they use their expertise to get around the guidelines and instructions rather than follow them.

There are other malfunctions in the way the NREGA is implemented: payments are not made according to the statutory minimum wage, the gram sabha has little say in deciding what work should be undertaken, and none of the facilities are available at the worksite as stipulated under the Act (for more details see earlier story 'Poor implementation of NREGS in Bihar').

Campaign outcomes

Since few people know about the NREGA, or what their rights are under it, they do not demand that the scheme be properly implemented.

In that respect, the PACS Programme campaign has had an impact by making dalits understand the importance of meetings and sabhas. In all the gram sabhas held on August 15, 2008, questions related to the NREGA were put to the mukhiya, a trend that will, hopefully, continue.

From September 2008, the rural development department has regularised the holding of monthly gram sabhas on the NREGA. PACS Programme CSOs in Bihar can thereby ensure that dalits participate in the sabhas in large numbers.

At a meeting with PACS Programme representatives, top officials of the RDD revealed that the state government was looking to rehabilitate Madhepura district which has been ravaged by floods. After the flood waters recede, villagers will be employed to work on their land and build houses under the NREGS.