The Narendra Modi government at the Center has given a big gift to the laborers working under the 'Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme' (MGNREGA). Making a big announcement before the upcoming Lok Sabha Elections (2024), the government has increased the MNREGA wage rate by 3 to 10 percent. This means that now MNREGA workers will get more money. Information in this regard has been given by issuing a notification on Thursday. 

New rates will be implemented from April 1.
This increase in wage rates for the financial year 2023-25 ​​by the PM Modi-led central government will be implemented from April 1, 2024, before the Lok Sabha elections. If we look at the government notification, the wage rate has been increased the least by 3 percent in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, whereas in Goa the wage rate has been increased the most by 10.6 percent. While in Goa the wage rate has been increased by Rs 34 per day, in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand the wage rate has been increased by Rs 7 per day.

MNREGA (MGNREGA) program was started in the year 2005 by the Ministry of Rural Development . These are employment guarantee schemes and under this, the government sets a minimum wage at which people are hired in rural areas. This includes work ranging from digging ponds, and pits to making drains. In this, 100 days of employment is guaranteed in a year. 

This announcement was made during the budget.
During the interim budget of the Narendra Modi government presented in the Parliament on February 1, 2024, the government had announced to increase in the MGNREGA budget. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had said during her speech that the MNREGA budget estimate for the financial year 2024-25 has been increased to Rs 86,000 crore, before this the budget estimate of MNREGA for the financial year 2023-24 has been increased to Rs. Was Rs 60,000 crore.

The highest increase was in Rajasthan last year. It
is noteworthy that the Narendra Modi government at the Center had issued a notification on 24 March 2023 last year regarding the revision of wage rates under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGA) for the financial year 2023-24. The notification was issued. At that time the wage rates have been revised from Rs 7 to Rs 26. According to last year's notification, the highest increase in wage rates was made in Rajasthan and here the revised wage was increased from Rs 231 to Rs 255 per day. 

If reports are to be believed, during the current financial year, there is an increase in demand for employment under MNREGA due to uneven monsoon. In this sense, the government's decision to increase wages just before the Lok Sabha elections is a big gift for crores of people associated with MNREGA. Similar to the increase in the wage rates of MNREGA in this election year, the Central Government had decided in the year 2019 also.

Apart from this increase in other states,
the wage rate has been increased by 5.5 percent in West Bengal and the workers here will now get Rs 250 per day from Rs 237. The highest rate of NREGS wages (Rs 374 per day) has been fixed for Haryana. Whereas the lowest rate of Rs 234 per day has been fixed for Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland. In Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, which share the same wage rate under NREGS, the rates have been increased by about 10 percent to Rs 243 per day from the current Rs 221. An increase of 10 percent in NREGS wages has also been seen in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana. 

What did TMC MP Saket Gokhale say? 
Regarding this decision of the government, TMC leader Saket Gokhale has said that it is shameful and shocking that in the wage revision announced today for MNREGA, the Modi government has increased the wages for workers in Bengal by only 5%. Has increased. Compared to this, the increase made in other states is very high. He said that after blocking MNREGA wage arrears of over Rs 7000 crore, the anti-Bengal BJP has again resorted to targeting the people of West Bengal by punishing them with a 5% wage hike, while BJP-ruled states will get a 10% wage hike. Got an increase of up to. This is another example of BJP's hatred towards Bengal.