'Anti-poor' Modi govt bent on 'oppressing' MGNREGA workers: Kharge

NEW DELHI: Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on Thursday alleged that the "anti-poor" Modi government is bent on "oppressing" MGNREGA workers and reiterated the party's demands that their minimum wage per day be fixed at Rs 400 and that they be provided at least 150 days of work in a year.

Kharge shared on X a media report which claimed that the government is unlikely to raise the daily floor wage under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) substantially, on top of the usual annual hike, despite recommendations by two panels.

"It seems that the anti-people Modi government has refused to increase MGNREGA wages. This is like attacking the rights of MGNREGA workers," Kharge said in a post in Hindi on X.

He pointed out that recently, the Joint Parliamentary Committee had recommended increasing the daily wage of MGNREGA workers to Rs 400 per day.

"Amarjeet Sinha's High Level Committee formed in 2023 had also suggested increasing wages and increasing the budget of MGNREGA. But the anti-poor Modi government is bent on oppressing MGNREGA workers," the Congress chief said.

Be it excluding nearly seven crore registered workers from MGNREGA by imposing the condition of Aadhaar-based payment, or allocating the lowest MGNREGA budget in the last 10 years as compared to the total budget, the Modi government has been negatively impacting MGNREGA, he said.

"MGNREGA - Employment guarantee scheme was brought by the Congress Party for the poorest families of our country. We are firm on our two demands — Minimum wage of Rs 400 per day should be fixed for MGNREGA workers and at least 150 days of work in a year be provided to them," Kharge said.