The Government today said the migration of the labour force in search of employment has come down due to the effective implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) in the country. This was stated by the Minister for Rural Development Mr Jairam Ramesh while replying to supplementaries during the question hour in the Rajya Sabha. He said MGNREGS is a demand driven programme providing guaranteed employment to the people in the rural areas.

He said the primary objective of the scheme is to enhance the livelihood security of the rural households by providing up to 100 days guaranteed employment in a year to every household for doing unskilled manual work on demand. He said the Centre has decided to pay wages in cash to the people engaged under the MGNREG scheme in all the 78 naxal-affected areas and places where there are no banks and post offices. The Minister said there have been no reports to the effect that demand for work under MGNREGS has been affected by low rate of wages. He said the total expenditure incurred under the scheme was over 37,303 crore rupees in 2011-12