New Delhi, 20 October (H.S.): The Congress has alleged irregularities in wage payments under a rural employment scheme in Maharashtra’s drought-hit Beed district, claiming that several villagers have been without work for months even as official records show them as having worked. The party described the Viksit Bharat–Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin), or VB-G RAM G scheme, introduced in place of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), as a blow to the social security framework of rural India.

Congress general secretary in charge of communications, Jairam Ramesh, levelled the allegations in a post on the social media platform X on Tuesday, citing a report published by a news website. Ramesh alleged that local political figures were appropriating workers’ wages. He also referred to allegations of fraudulent attendance records and irregularities involving cloned applications in Uttar Pradesh and other BJP-ruled states.

Describing the alleged practices as more than mere corruption, Ramesh called them the systematic theft of workers’ earnings.

He said the report found that attendance records at several worksites in Beed district showed workers as present on October 4, although no workers were found at the locations during physical inspections. Citing a district administration official, the report stated that 23,000 entries had been rejected over the previous four months after irregularities came to light.

Ramesh said MGNREGA had served as a source of guaranteed employment for rural households during periods of economic distress. He argued that under the new scheme, the rights of rural workers and the security of their wages were no longer adequately protected.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar