Jaipur: On the lines of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGA), Rajasthan is to launch the country’s first employment guarantee scheme for the urban poor. The scheme, named Indira Gandhi Shehari Rojgar Guarantee Yojana, will start on September 9th with a budget of Rs 800 crore.
The scheme aims to provide 100 days of guaranteed employment to the urban poor, especially those who lost their jobs during Covid-19.
"Every person should get employment and no needy, helpless or poor person should remain deprived of his/her livelihood. Employment should be available for people who lost their livelihood during Covid to lead their life," said CM Ashok Gehlot in a review meeting of the scheme.
During the Covid period, when the employment crisis increased, this MGNREGA scheme proved to be a boon in rural areas. Keeping this in view, Rajasthan CM Gehlot decided to start an urban employment guarantee scheme along the lines of MGNREGS and announced this scheme in this year’s budget.
Unemployed people in the urban areas will be employed for 100 days every year in the scheme. The State Government has kept a budget provision of Rs 800 crore for the financial year 2022-23.
The scheme will be implemented through the Department of Local Bodies. All the members of the job cardholder family aged between 18 and 60 years will be eligible. The employment will be provided within 15 days after the registration.
So far, more than 2 lakh job cardholders have registered for employment and 9500 works have been identified. The estimated cost of the identified works is approximately Rs 658 crore.
Works related to environment conservation, water conservation, cleanliness and sanitation, stopping defacement of property, service-related works, convergence work, heritage conservation etc will be done in this scheme.
