The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and the Right to Information (RTI) Act are two schemes that have truly benefited the people of India.
During the entire Covid pandemic period, MGNREGA has played an important role in providing job opportunities to the people.
Many distressed people after losing jobs due to the impact of Covid started to return to their villages from the cities and towns.
As unemployment loomed large, jobless people turned to MGNREGA for work.
However, in a regressive move, the central government has reduced the MGNREGA fund allocation in this year’s budget. From last year’s Rs 98,000 crores, it has been reduced to Rs 73,000 crores in the 2022-23 Budget.
The present BJP government at the centre has repeatedly tried to weaken the RTI and MGNREGA.
These two schemes were implemented by the previous Congress government at the centre. The BJP sees them as a kind of Congress legacy, and therefore, has been making every effort to try to weaken them. But the RTI and MGNREGA are quite popular among the masses. This has forced the BJP to reluctantly continue them. This is a wrong attitude.
The government may change hands, but the schemes which benefit the citizens should be continued without any political prejudice.