Visakhapatnam: Halt to NREGS works sought

Visakhapatnam: The Human Rights Forum (HRF) and Samalochana demanded immediate stoppage of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) works as they pose danger to the lives of workers given the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

The forum members called upon the government to pay all registered NREGS workers (including inactive workers) full wages as advance at the earliest during the lockdown period.

Further, they urged that the wages should not be paid as unemployment allowance but as wages for the period when they should have been working but were unable to do so due to lockdown.

With over 93 lakh registered workers, the scheme has been the lifeline for lakhs of households in providing livelihood security especially during the lean summer months.

What is worrisome is that more than 8.3 lakh workers attended NREGS works on Wednesday across the state, including districts that recorded high number of coronavirus positive cases. For instance, Prakasam district with a number of mandals declared as containment zones has recorded the highest number of NREGS workers (1.95 lakh) reporting for work.

In the present circumstances, continuing NREGS works, as the April 15 Central government's order specifies, amounts to violation of the basic human rights of the workers as it would not be possible to ensure physical distancing in the very nature of their work and places them at grave risk.

While NREGS pending dues have been cleared, many workers are in no position to collect them as banking services and customer service points are shut down. Given the current situation, the government should ensure door delivery of cash through village volunteers.

B Chakradhar of Samalochana and HRF AP and Telangana coordination committee member V S Krishna also called upon the government to enrol all NREGS workers as registered workers under the Building and Other Construction Workers (BoCW) Act so that they can access social security benefits in the form of insurance, scholarships for education of children, pensions, etc.,