National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme in India - A Review

This paper presents results on the participation of rural workers in the National Rural Employment Guarantee Program based on a pilot survey of three villages in Udaipur district, Rajasthan, India. Three villages (Dhundiya, Karanpur and Prithvisingh Ji Ka Khera) were covered. Total number of households interviewed in December, 2007, was 340. Here the focus is on participation in NREG of different socio-economic groups and the determinants of the participation of these groups. It is discovered that the mean participation was 59 days and that targeting was efficient with other labour, self employed in agriculture, SC and ST as well as those with smaller landholdings benefiting the most from the program. Thus the performance of the National Rural Employment Guarantee program has been far from dismal.