Protesting nonpayment of wages in the MGNREGS works for more than six months, Nehena villagers gheraoed the Khariar block office.
likewise, the locals also demonstrated at Boden block before the watershed mission field office demanding payment of wages pending for more than four months.
The District Rural Development Agency (DRDA) sources revealed that payment of wages under NREGS has been delayed this year all over the district. The target of employment generation under MGNREGS fixed for the year 2016-17 was 10.57 lakh person days and the achievement till mid August is 80.42 per cent (85,022 person days). This shows that there is a great demand for work, and it has increased during the current year due to failure of agriculture.
However, delay in payment of wage has created much resentment within the workers. About `5.75 crore is yet to be paid to the labourers towards their wages.
“Wages are transferred electronically to the workers’ bank accounts after we send online Fund Transfer Order (FTO) at our level and after that it is the responsibility of the banks to transfer wages to workers’ account. The FTO has already been sent for the outstanding dues, but unfortunately, the wages have not been transferred to labourers accounts,” said Project Director of DRDA Pradip Naik.
It is found in the official website of the NREGS that a total of 54,619 transactions are pending with the banks for transfer of wages to NREGS labourers.
“Payments to workers have been pending since June 29 last. No labourer in the district has received their wages in last one and a half months,” said DRDA officials.
The delay has caused hardship to thousands of poor households of the district, who solely depend upon NREGS for their livelihood. It is learnt that the district authority has informed about this delay to the PR department several times, but no one could confirm why the delay has occurred.