Right to Food Campaign: Employment Guarantee Act

Right to Food Campaign

Employment Guarantee Act: Tools for Action and Research

The enactment of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) in August 2005 was a significant step towards the realisation of the right to work. Since then, groups and individuals from all over the country have attempted to hold the state to its obligations in a variety of ways: by spreading awareness of labourer's entitlements under the NREGA; by organizing social audits to combat corruption; by seeking redressal for violations of the guidelines; and by building associations or unions of NREGA workers.

This page contains "tools for action" which may be used to further the goal of making the Employment Guarantee Act a reality. Feel free to download, translate and adapt any of this material as necessary.

NREGA Made Simple
- Primers and Manuals
  - Employment Guarantee Act 2005 : A Primer (December 2008)
  - Rozgar Guarantee Kanoon 2005: a primer on the NREGA [Hindi] (published November 2007)
  - Kya kahta hai Rozgar Guarantee Kanoon 2005: a primer on the NREGA prepared by the Mazdoor Kisan Samiti [Hindi]
  - Transparency, Accountability - Using the People's Right to Information for Proper Implementation of the NREGA (MKSS Rajasthan)
  - The Right to Information Act: A Primer (National Campaign for People's Right to Information, 2005)
- Powerpoints
  - Status of NREGA (Naresh Saxena)
  - Presentation on the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MKSS Rajasthan)
  - Presentation on the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (Jean Drèze and Reetika Khera)
  - How is NREGA doing? (Jean Dr�ze and Christian Oldiges, November 2007)
- Films
  - Right to Work Song
  - Right to Information and Corruption A Film by Jan Madhyam Productions
  - Right to Information: MKSS Produced by Jharna Jhaveri, Directed by Anurag Singh
  - Right to Work: SWRC A Film by Mona Powar, Panini Anand, Avinash Raghuvanshi and Anurag Singh
Rozgar Adhikar Toolkit
- NREGA job card registration form (Hindi) (MS-Word document; requires kruti dev 10 font)
- Work Application Forms
  - Individual work application form [Hindi]
  - Group work application form [Hindi]
- Delays in Wage Payments: A Toolkit
- Muster Roll Verification
  - Simplified guidelines for muster roll verification (January 2008) [Hindi]
  - Guidelines for muster roll verification [appendices] (29 July 2006) [Oriya translation]
  - Worksheets for muster roll verification (A3 size) [Hindi]
- Survey Tools
  - Worksite checklist [Hindi] prepared for a social audit and jan sunwai in Jhalawar district, Rajasthan, by the Rozgar Evum Suchna Ka Adhikar Abhiyan (Rajasthan), and the Hum Kisan Sangathan in February 2008.
Field Surveys
- Basic Questionnaires and Guidelines
  - Questionnaires [Hindi] prepared by the Movement for Right to Food and Employment, UP, for a large-scale social audit of the NREGA in December 2006-January 2007.
Social Audits
- Mini-Manuals
  - One hundred Tips for an Effective Social Audit
- Draft Manuals
  - Social Audit (Transparency and Accountability) Rules and manual: a draft note prepared by Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS), based on a National Workshop on Social Audit convened by the Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India, in Udaipur on 20 February 2007.
  - Social audit and the NREGA: A users manual (Centre for Equity Studies, with the support of Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan; sponsored by the National Institute of Rural Development)
- Official Guidelines
  - Government orders on social audits under the NREGA (Panchayati Raj and Rural Development Department, Government of Andhra Pradesh):
    - Guidelines for conducting social audits under the NREGA
    - Responsibility of administrative machinery and norms of expenditure in conduct of social audit

Last updated: 20 October 2009