In April this year, about 102 million person days of work were generated, less than half of the 247 million last year The hundreds of thousands of migrant workers leaving cities and returning to rural India may find staying afloat an uphill task.
Landless families dependent on wage work are likely to be hit hard as the winter harvesting season is over and the rural jobs scheme is faltering, resulting in employment generation being only a fraction of previous years’ numbers.
Person days of work generated under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), a social safety net scheme that promises 100 days of work in a year to every rural household, is a trickle in the 2020-21 financial year, compared with previous