The Prime Minister has directed the Planning Commission to address the deficiency and gaps in the working of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act – MGNREGA. Releasing a report card on MGNREGA 'Sameeksha in New Delhi today, Dr. Manmohan Singh said the UPA government's most popular and successful flagship programme has created more than 120 million jobcards each year.

Nearly 37 thousand crore rupees are earned by villagers across the country under the scheme. The World's largest and most ambitious social security and public works programme benefits 50 million rural households in the country – almost one in four families.

But, he said he was not fully satisfied with the way the scheme is working. There are problems of late payments, which needs to be addressed immediately.

Referring to the gaps highlighted byRural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh and Planning Commission member Mihir Shah he said these needs to be fixed by Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia.

The Prime Minister said that the programme can very well become a silver bullet for India’s rural renewal, if the local bodies can rise to the challenge. He said the Panchayati Raj institutions have to gear themselves to play the central role assigned to them.

The Prime Minister expressed hope that the new operational guidelines that will be issued by the Ministry of Rural Development will address issues brought out in the review.

MNREGA Sameeksha – is a collection of research studies conducted on the programme under which 1 lakh 10 thousand crore rupees have been spent to pay wages to 1,200 crore people.