Top Congress leaders on Saturday attended a key meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the party’s highest decision-making body, to discuss the prevailing political situation and chart the party’s response to the government’s decision to replace the UPA-era Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), 2005.
The deliberations focused on the Centre’s move to introduce the Viksit Bharat–Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Act (VB-G RAM G), which replaced MGNREGA during the recently concluded winter session of Parliament. The Bill has since received President Droupadi Murmu’s assent.
The extended CWC meeting was attended by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi, Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, and chief ministers of Congress-ruled states including Karnataka, Telangana and Himachal Pradesh. Presidents of Pradesh Congress Committees (PCCs) also participated in the meeting.
Party leaders are expected to finalise an action plan to counter the government’s move, which the Congress and other opposition parties have strongly criticised. They have alleged that replacing MGNREGA and removing Mahatma Gandhi’s name from the scheme is an affront to his legacy.
The new law provides a statutory guarantee of 125 days of wage employment in a financial year for every rural household whose adult members are willing to undertake unskilled manual work. However, unlike the earlier centrally sponsored scheme, the legislation mandates a 60:40 funding share between the Centre and states.
The meeting also assumes significance ahead of Assembly elections scheduled next year in Assam, Kerala, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, with leaders expected to deliberate on the party’s electoral strategy in these states.
