New Delhi: The Government has revised the
wages for unskilled manual workers under the national rural
employment guarantee scheme by indexing it to inflation, Rural
Development Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh said on Tuesday.
He told the Rajya Sabha during Question Hour that the
original National Rural Employment Guarantee Act provides for
wages to be indexed to the Consumer Price Index for
agricultural labour.
Against the Rs 100 per day wages originally approved,
actual wages given are as high as Rs 181 in Nicobar.
Haryana gives Rs 179 per day while daily wage in
Chandigarh under the scheme is Rs 174. It is Rs 170 in Andaman
and Rs 150 in Kerala. The wages are in the range of Rs 118 to
Rs 138 per day in other states, he said.
Deshmukh, however, did not give a direct reply to a
question raised by Brinda Karat (CPI-M) on why recommendations
of the National Advisory Council headed by UPA Chairperson
Sonia Gandhi in this regard were not implemented.
"Powers are with the Central government to notify wage
rates," he said.
The reply did not satisfy Karat who continued to raise the
issue.
Deskhmukh said regular monitoring was being done but the
primary responsibility of implementing the scheme rested with
the state governments.
Many times, many state governments are not cooperating in
checking irregularities, he said without naming the state
governments.
PTI
First Published: Tuesday, February 22, 2011, 14:49