NREGS given a humane face in Ukhrul
Source: The Sangai Express

Ukhrul, September 23 2009: The flag ship programme of the UPA Government, the National Rural Employment Generation Scheme, has brought a smile to a number of the rural poor, but Ukhrul district administration has taken a step forward and has given it a more humane face, by forwarding this scheme to the physically challenged people and the result is showing.

Meet AS Pamthingla, a 50 year old woman and mother of a disabled child as well as wife of a man, who has been rendered virtually disabled, after undergoing surgery on the back portion of the neck.

This 50 year old woman, walks with a stoop and cannot straighten up, following an operation on her back.

With her husband, AS Mingthing, unable to work, Pamthingla had to do odd jobs and weave clothes to make ends meet, but after NREGS was implemented in the district in April last year, her condition has improved.

This is all due to the efforts taken up by the district administration to reach out to the disabled persons in the district under NREGS.

At present there are 134 registered disabled persons in Ukhrul district, with Ukhrul district headquarters accounting for 70 of them.

Altogether there are 39,000 NREGS job card holders in the district.

Realising that disabled persons cannot be expected to put in the same amount of work or even take up certain type of work, which are physically challenging, the district administration is seriously studying the modalities utilising the services of the disabled people.

A drain built under the NREGS, the locker for villages and inset a beneficiary mom and child

Towards this end, possibilities of employing them in avenues such as looking after the children of the workers, while they work, to prepare and serve tea or in case they are skilled use them for making mats or Moras.

Pamthingla is working under the job card given in the name of her husband, and process is underway to prepare a job card in her own name.

Not surprisingly all her co-workers co-operate and no one complains if she is unable to work as much as the other able bodied people.

The extended benefits of NREGS has also touched the life another disabled young lady, 18 year old Peace Raleng.

She makes tea and serves it to the workers, during their break.

The district administration is considering giving her a job card too.

Another story is of Peace Raleng, a 48 year old woman.

Her husband passed away some time back, and she was left alone to fend for her four children, the eldest of whom is handicapped.

Earlier, before NREGS was implemented in the district, she earned whatever she could by weaving clothes and many a time she had to borrow the raw material for the weaving.

Two of her children had to drop out of school after Class XII, but now after the NREGS came, she has been able to put her youngest child in school, and she is studying in Class IX.

Reaching out to the less fortunate people, is not the only initiative taken up by the district administration.

In a unique move, a locker system has been installed at the SDO office of Ukhrul.

Here all files, documents etc of each village falling under the district are stored in the locker, which is earmarked for each village.

This means greater efficiency and faster disposal of file work.

The district administration has also succeeded in infusing a sense of competition amongst the villagers.

All works taken up under the NREGS are studied and compared by a Monitoring Committee.

The best work is then selected and the villagers rewarded with due publicity to serve as the model for the others.

Works taken up under NREGS here include digging ponds and harvesting rain water, drainage, roads and plantation of fruit bearing trees.