Date:02/12/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/12/02/stories/2008120259600500.htm

Andhra Pradesh - Visakhapatnam

NREGP should be part of inclusive development, says social activist

Staff Reporter

Two-day global conference begins at Andhra University

AU Rector B. Parvateswara Rao greeting Rajesh Tandon, president, Participatory Research in Asia, at an international conference on NREGP in Visakhapatnam on Monday.

VISAKHAPATNAM: Noted social activist Rajesh Tandon on Monday said National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (NREGP) should become part of inclusive development.

He was speaking at the inaugural session of two-day international conference on ‘Citizenship, participation and accountability in NREGP. The conference is being conducted jointly by the Department of Social Work, Andhra University in collaboration with Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA) and Laya, both NGOs under a UGC-sponsored programme.

Dr. Tandon, who is the president of PRIA, said accountability for purpose and mission was the need of the hour to make NREGP a success. He said it should stimulate employment and create durable assets for which an institutional design was required to achieve the mandate and ensure sustainable livelihood.

He said there was a need to sensitise on democratic accountability of citizens as well as institutions so as to synergise consensual approach within democratic framework and accountability.

Stating that accountability had multiple meanings, he said everyone had the responsibility to stimulate the culture of accountability.

AU Rector B. Parvateswara Rao said NREGP was a well-designed scheme aimed at providing guaranteed employment to rural poor for 100 days a year. “Major chunk of rural people have remained poor over the years. This has happened not because schemes are bad but mainly due to lacunae in the implementation,” he said.

Prof. Rao said the failures should be spotted so as to take mid-course corrective measures. He said as fallout of globalisation, labour intensive and income generation sectors like fisheries, dairy, poultry and agriculture were suffering and said NREGP being a massive programme with an allocation of Rs.30,000 crores should be implemented in proper way by involving the grassroots level institutions.

AU College of Arts Principal L.K. Mohan Rao presided. Conference director B. Devi Prasad, co-directors R.D. Sampath Kumar and P. Arjun spoke.