Rural Development Ministry's Aadhaar Based Payment Bridge System (ABPS) for making payments under MGNREGS should not be made compulsory, a Parliamentary Panel has recommended in a report tabled in Lok Sabha on Tuesday even as it also sought hiking the rate of wages paid under MGNREGS which were at present inadequate and not in consonance with the rising cost of living.

The Standing Committee on Rural Development and Panchayati Raj said alternative mechanisms should always operate to ensure that the primary goal of the scheme to provide wages does not get defeated due to lack of proper implementation of technology.

 The Committee also pulled up the government on low wages under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) and recommended a better inflation linked index for payment of wages to the workers.

 Noting that the APBS has been made mandatory since January 1, 2024, it said that while accepting the gains of APBS, the “Committee is of the view that it is too early to make it mandatory as the problems relating to Aadhar seeding still have not been resolved leading to exclusion of lakhs of workers.”

"The Committee, therefore, reiterates their earlier recommendation that APBS should not be made mandatory and alternative mechanisms should always operate side by side to ensure that the primary goal of MGNREGA to provide wages does not get defeated due to lack of proper implementation of technology," it said.

"Taking up works under MGNREGA is a sort of last resort for many of the poor rural masses who do not have any other option of livelihood or job option to utilise but wages of such nominal nature sometime with delayed payment only discourage them and propel them to migrate and seek work in areas giving better remuneration," the panel said.

It said the panel has time and again urged the Department of Rural Development (DoRD) to increase the wage rates under MGNREGS by linking it to an index commensurate with national inflation, but the wage rates continue to remain stagnant on account.

  The panel also reiterated its recommendation for adoption of a much more economically viable method in identifying ways and means for the selection of an appropriate index commensurate with the inflationary trend.

 On the National Mobile Monitoring System (NMMS) app, a mobile and internet based platform, the panel said non-availability of smart phones, irregular power supply and lack of proper internet connectivity in various areas, the attendance of many MGNREGS workers is not getting recorded by the app.

 The Committee said this is leading to a delay in the payment of the wages.