Unsure of how to audit the flagship MGNREGA, as suggested by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, the rural development ministry has decided to take the issue in public domain.
However, citing corruption in the implementation of MGNREGA, through which the government has spent over `74,000 crores on wages alone in the past five years, activists have termed the move as delaying tactics.
On January 4, 2011, the CAG suggested that “model rules” framed by the ministry for social audit of MGNREGA be elevated as mandatory “audit rules” to strengthen accounting procedures, mandating independent, trained, and responsible social audit facilitators, a social audit directorate independent from the implementing agency, synergy with other audit processes, and its mentoring and supervision by the CAG.
After referring the matter to an expert committee on January 31, 2011, the rural development ministry now wants to invite public comments on the audit rules suggested by the CAG, said sources.
“It’s like delaying the whole process,” said Nikhil Dey of the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan, involved with social audit of the rural job plan in Rajasthan.
Activists said reports of corruption in the MGNREGA justify the need for strong and independent social audit processes, but the ministry appears to be undermining the commitment of the political leadership.
Both Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi flagged the need for social audit of MGNREGA on February 2, 2011, the fifth anniversary of the rural job plan.
The activists argued that amendments to the act brought by the ministry in December 2008 have turned social audits into a manipulated exercise in the control of village sarpanchs. Earlier, recommendations made by a sub group of the Central Employment Guarantee Council on Transparency and Accountability on social audit were referred to the CAG on October 28, 2010.