Economist decries scrapping of MGNREGA by Centre

Economist Prabhat Patnaik has criticised the “abandoning” of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) by the BJP-led government at the Centre.

Delivering a special lecture titled “A Set of Constitutionally Guaranteed Fundamental Economic Rights” after the release of a book in honour of late economist V.K. Natraj at the Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Research and Extension Centre, Manasagangothri here on Friday, Prof. Patnaik said the MGNREGA scheme was a “demand-based” scheme that conferred a right upon a person demanding work.

Demand-based approach

Even though the scheme, which seeks to replace MGNREGA, talks about 125 days of work against the 100 days earlier, Prof. Patnaik said any programme that did away with the “demand-based” guarantee programme would deny the “rights” to the workers.

He recalled that the MGNREGA had been introduced in the country after building a consensus among all parties. The scheme was implemented on the basis of a unanimous resolution in Parliament and all the parties had agreed to this, he said.

When a scheme introduced through a unanimous resolution in Parliament was suddenly overturned by a majority vote, it suggested “there is something fundamentally problematic in instituting a rights-based programme in the country,” he lamented.

Economic rights

Flagging India’s sharply rising income and wealth inequality, Prof. Patnaik also advocated the introduction of wealth tax and inheritance tax to finance a set of constitutionally guaranteed fundamental economic rights for citizens.

Arguing for the recognition of fundamental economic rights on a par with civil and political rights, Prof. Patnaik said resources for it could be mobilised by imposing these two taxes on the top 1% of the population.