What is Indira Gandhi Urban Employment Guarantee Scheme? 

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, while presenting State’s Budget for Financial Year 2022-23, proposed a new scheme for guaranteed employment for urban households. He said that Covid-19 has impacted the livelihood of a common man.

“While MGNREGA assisted people in rural areas, there is no such scheme for street vendors and those working at dhabas and restaurants in urban areas,” he said.

Under the scheme, employment will be provided for up to a hundred days in a year, and the State government will bear an additional expense of ₹800 crore for this. However, he did not elaborate on how the scheme will be implemented. 

What are the salient features of the scheme? 

The State government is yet to come out with a blue print of the new scheme, but there will be assured number of jobs for urban households. Also, the scheme will be based on a legal mechanism that will provide certain number of job days with wage to be decided soon. 

Is it modelled on MGNREGA?

Initial information suggest that the new scheme is based on MGNREGA. The mandate of the MGNREGA is to provide at least 100 days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every rural household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. 

Goals of MGNREGA include, social protection for the most vulnerable households in rural India by enhancing livelihood security of the rural poor through generation of wage employment opportunities leading to creation of durable assets, rejuvenate natural resource base of rural areas, create a durable and productive rural asset base, beside others. 

How severe is the problem of urban unemployment in India? 

Urban unemployment rate touched 9.3 per cent in January-March 2021 from 9.1 per cent in the same period of 2020. The Periodic Labour Force Survey released by the National Statistical Office (NSO) said the unemployment rate among males of all ages is 8.6 per cent and for women it is 11.8 per cent during the period. It was 10.3 per cent a quarter before. 

The survey showed that the situation has improved from April-June 2020, during the first lockdown when it was 20.8 per cent.

Considering the situation of employment in urban areas especially after Covid-19, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Labour in its 25th report titled ‘Impact of Covid-19 on Rising Unemployment and Loss of Jobs/ Livelihoods in Organised and Unorganised Sectors’ mentioned that unlike employment generation programmes in rural areas, the plight of urban poor has not got much attention of the Government.

The committee felt that building schools, hospitals, water works, connecting internal roads along with reforestation, soil reclamation etc. are some projects/ programmes which could generate substantial employment in the urban areas. Moreover, there is an imperative need for putting in place an Employment Guarantee Programme for the urban workforce in line with MGNREGA, the committee recommended. 

Experts have raised concerns on its implementation. Why? 

One of the basic concerns in identification of unemployed youth in urban area is different than rural area. Secondly, the issue is about the kind of job to be provided under the scheme will be totally different and will need more skilled workforce.