Crores of workers to be excluded as Aadhaar-based system made mandatory for MGNREGS, claims Congress

The Union government has made it mandatory that all workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, or MGNREGS, are paid through an Aadhaar-based payment system, reported The Hindu.

However, 34.8 % of those who hold job cards under the scheme, which guarantees 100 days of work for every rural household in the country, were still ineligible for the payment system as of December 27, according to Union Rural Development Ministry data, reported The Hindu.

The Congress alleged that on account of the mandate, crores of people will be prevented from earning a basic income.

For workers to be paid under the Aadhaar-based payment system, their Aadhaar details have to be seeded to their job cards and bank accounts and the Aadhaar details need be mapped with the database of the National Payments Corporation of India. Then, the institutional identification number of the bank needs be mapped on the National Payments Corporation of India database.

On February 1, the Centre had made it mandatory for all payments under the scheme to be made through the Aadhaar-based payment system. Earlier, the workers had the option to choose a bank account-based payment.

However, since then, the Centre had extended the deadline to make the system mandatory five times. The last extension ended on...

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