Where are we living?

 Today in the morning, a news made me stunned! I didn’t believe my eyes. The news was, around 100 NREGA workers in Gudaliya village, dist Tonk, engaged in digging a stretch of land for the past 13 days were paid Rs.1/- as wages. The district administration is justifying the payment saying it was a small area collectively dug by the workers. The district collector said, “"There is no scam or corruption as all the concerning documents have been checked properly. All entries are proper and in place. A sum of Rs 1,215 was decided after measurement and it was equally distributed.”
I should tell you the back ground of NREGA(National rural employment guarantee Act),before the name MG (Mahatma Gandhi) was added and renamed as Mahatma Gandhi National rural employment  guarantee act. It was the most optimistic project of the UPA Government. The act was brought about by the UPA coalition Government supported by the Left Parties. It was enacted by the Legislation on 25^th August 2005.

The aim was, enhancing the livelihood security of people in areas by guaranteeing hundred days of employment in every financial year to adult members in any rural household willing to do public work related unskilled manual work at the statutory minimum wage Rs.100/- per day, whether or not they belong to BPL population(below poverty level). The UPA Government promised a lot. The aims and objectives were pretty impressive like works must be targeted towards a set of specific rural development activities such as water conservation and harvesting, afforestation, rural connectivity, flood control etc. In FY (financial year) 2010-2011, the outlay for the scheme is Rs.40.100 Cr. The Government is even planning to open a call center for the convenience of the people.

Government makes plans, allocates money but the responsibility of the proper implementation is vested on everyone especially the officials who have been appointed for the job. The people of the village (most of them are farmers) have been suffering from drought for last few years. No option left for them except choosing this. The collector is justifying herself and the procedure.
There are so many poverty elevation programmers in the country but still more that 25% population lives below poverty line though. As long as the corruption exists, there will be no any other way to get out this situation.
  I was asking myself a question “where are we living?”