AGARTALA, June 27 (TIWN): The BJP led NDA Government at the center has brought a ray of hope for the deprived REGA workers of land-locked state Tripura. With an aim to curtail the delay of payment under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) the Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) at the center had decided to pay the REGA workers here in Tripura directly from the ministry to their bank accounts.

According to the Additional Secretary of Rural Development C. K. Jamatia, the REGA payment from now onwards would be directly transferred to the bank accounts of the workers here from the MoRD.

It is worthy to mention here that the REGA workers here at the state are deprived from their wages at large with the delay of the payment by the state government here. According to the official here at least 10 days are required to pay the wages to the workers due to a lengthy procedure, but the system has been changed now to facilitate the REGA workers here.

Besides, on yet another momentum to the centrally sponsored REGA scheme, the central government has decided to increase the mandays and announced that a total of 5, 35, 078 mandays would be generated this year with which on an average of 87 mandays would be provided to the 6.14 lakhs job card holders here in Tripura, said Jamatia. At present the rate of wages increased up to Rs. 167. On an average 87 mandays will be provided to the job card holders this year.

It has been decided by the center according to the average performance of last three years.

A total of Rs 1580 crore is sanctioned for MGNREGA in the financial year of 2015-16 which is having joint share of central and state government and from this sanctioned fund, 60% fund would turn out for the wages of the REGA workers.

However, from July 1, the REGA workers of the 15 selected blocks by the center would receive their payments directly from the MoRD. As a result the payment would be not got delay further.

It is to be mentioned that, people under APL or BPL category can work in MGNREGA scheme only if they have the job card holder and they should reside in rural areas. At present, there are 6.14 lakh job card holders in the state.

However, it is to be mentioned here that just after the mob violence took place here in Tripura under Unakoti District over the delay of the REGA payment the ruling CPI-M accusing the center’s alleged that earlier the then central govt. had launched Electronic Fund Management System (EFMS) for ever states in order to pay the REGA wages to the workers, but the present govt. at the centre had suddenly changed the system to Public Fund Management System (PFMS) with effect from April 1, 2015, without making any contact to the states including Tripura.

This has brought a major hurdle for the state govt. here to pay the REGA wages to the workers,” CPI-M said.  The party also alleged that the central govt. is wholly responsible for the delay of the NREGA payment.

According to the officials of the rural development here on March 24, 2015 Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) on its sudden move written to nationalized Bank Chairman to start the PFMS soon with an effect from April 1, 2015. Later a copy was given to all the state governments and has been uploaded at the website on March 26, 2015. The CPI-M said that the central govt. has taken the decision of launching the PFMS without holding any meeting with the Chief Ministers or any other state govt. authorities.

However, the wide spread tension among the MNREGA workers had taken a bigger dimension with reports of more and more BDO offices being ransacked reaching the capital here.