Madhya Pradesh: Machines being used to deepen pond instead of men in Chhatarpur

Chhatarpur (Madhya Pradesh): The government is giving crores of rupees to labourers through the schemes under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). The labourers are getting jobs for construction work in village Panchayats, but due to the arbitrariness of the Sarpanch and secretary in the Panchayats, the laborers are not getting employment. Instead of labourers, machines are used to get the work done.

Job cards, labour cards are only on papers and work is carried out through machines. One such case has come to the fore in Mauja Hanspura of Gram Panchayat Tahnaga of Janpad Panchayat Lavkushnagar. Here, under the MGNREGA scheme, the work of deepening a pond is done through Sarpanch. But the LNT machine is working on the spot instead of the labourers.

When some media persons reached the spot and saw the machines working there, the Sarpanch hurriedly stopped those machines, saying as laborers were not available in his panchayat, he used machines to carry out the work. According to some villagers, there is corruption in every step of the work done under the MGNREA scheme.  

One of the main objectives of the MGNREA scheme was to stop migration of labourers, but many people have left the district for other places in search of livelihood, sources said, adding that there are many villages where houses can be seen locked from outside.

When the issue was raised before chief executive officer of Janpad Panchayat in Luv Kush Nagar, Om Kesharwani, he said, “LNT machine cannot used in pond-deepening work, if pond deepening is being done by the sarpanch in Hanspura of Tehnaga Panchayat with the help of machine, it is against the rule.”

“As I have got this information from you, I will send a sub-engineer to the spot for investigation. And if machines are found there, action will be taken against the Sarpanch according to rules,” Kesharwani said.