Centre to Introduce ‘Viksit Bharat—Guarantee For Rozgar And Ajeevika Mission (Gramin)’ Bill

Why in News

• The Union government is set to introduce the Viksit Bharat—Guarantee For Rozgar And Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Bill, also referred to as VB G RAM G, which seeks to replace the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), 2005.

Key Objectives

• Strengthen rural employment and livelihoods.
• Enhance efficiency, transparency, and timely wage payments.
• Align rural works with long-term development and disaster resilience goals.

Major Changes Proposed

• Increase in Guaranteed Workdays
  • Annual guaranteed employment raised from 100 days to 125 days.
• Timely Wage Payments
  • Payments to be made within 7 to 15 days of completion of work.
  • Unemployment allowance provision if payments are delayed beyond the stipulated period.
• Categorisation of Works
  Work under the scheme to be divided into four broad categories:
  1. Water security
  2. Rural infrastructure
  3. Livelihood infrastructure
  4. Disaster resilience
• No works to be undertaken during peak agricultural seasons.
• Transparency and Accountability
  • Use of biometric authentication and geo-tagging.
  • Multi-level grievance redressal mechanism proposed.

Funding Pattern

• Unlike MGNREGA, which is a centrally sponsored scheme with:
  • 100% wages of unskilled labour paid by the Centre,
  • States bearing part of skilled labour and material costs,
• Under VB G RAM G, funding will be shared as:
  • 60:40 between Centre and most States
  • 90:10 for North-Eastern and Himalayan States
  • 100% Central funding for Union Territories

Financial Outlay

• Proposed annual expenditure: ₹1.51 lakh crore
• Central government share: ₹95,692 crore

About MGNREGA (Background)

• Launched in 2005 by the then UPA government.
• Provides a legal guarantee of 100 days of wage employment to rural households.
• Considered a landmark social security programme over the past two decades.

Significance of the New Bill

• Expands employment guarantee and income security in rural India.
• Shifts focus from short-term relief to asset creation, livelihoods, and resilience.
• Introduces tighter payment timelines and technology-driven transparency.
• Represents a major restructuring of India’s flagship rural employment programme.