Lucknow: Claiming that only Congress workers were fighting for people’s rights on the ground, AICC general secretary and UP in-charge Avinash Pande on Monday accused the BJP of weakening the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA).Addressing a state-level ‘Constitution dialogue and MGNREGA bachao sangram’ at the UP Congress headquarters, Pande said the party would intensify its struggle to protect the landmark employment guarantee law.
The programme marked 20 years of MGNREGA and was held as part of a nationwide campaign to defend the Act. Congress leaders alleged that the Centre was systematically diluting the law and undermining the rights of workers. Party workers, NGOs, civil society organisations and representatives of tribal communities from across UP attended the event.Recalling the origins of MGNREGA, Pande said the law was enacted under the leadership of Sonia Gandhi and former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to strengthen the rural economy and empower landless farmers and labourers. “The Act gave workers the right to decide when and how much work they would do,” he said. He added that the scheme became a global model and proved its relevance during the Covid-19 pandemic. Alleging that the BJP was attempting to dismantle the law, Pande said this reflected the saffron party’s anti-farmer and anti-labour mindset.Presiding over the programme, UP Congress president Ajay Rai said the MGNREGA bachao sangram was being carried out across the country under the leadership of Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Rahul Gandhi and AICC general secretary Priyanka Gandhi. “We will accept nothing less than the Act in its original spirit,” Rai said.Rai alleged that while the Congress enacted MGNREGA as a statutory right, the present govt was reducing it to a scheme, thereby depriving workers of their guaranteed entitlements. Referring to the recently presented Union Budget, he claimed it failed to offer any concrete measures to strengthen farmers, landless labourers or the rural economy.Several Congress functionaries, including national secretaries and UP in-charges Dheeraj Gurjar, Satyanarayan Patel, Neelanshu Chaturvedi and Tauqeer Alam, also addressed the gathering. MLA Virendra Chaudhary and former MLA Louis Khurshid were among those present.The event saw participation from a wide range of NGOs and social organisations, along with representatives of the Sahariya, Gond and Kol tribal communities. Ambika Prasad Mishra, national president of the MGNREGA mazdoor union, was also present.Former MPs, ex-ministers, former MLAs, district and city Congress office-bearers, and hundreds of party workers and MGNREGA labourers attended the programme, which concluded with a call to step up the campaign to protect the employment guarantee law.
