Suu Kyi raises questions about MNREGS during visit

Suu Kyi said that most welfare schemes seemed to have been hijacked by the politically and socially well connected, to which Jairam Ramesh said the government had no answers presently.

Many in India have pointed out potential loopholes India’s poverty alleviation and social welfare programmes and even Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi on visiting a village in Anantpur district in Andhra Pradesh questioned the implementation of the schemes.

“The better educated ones tend to dominate and the ones with better social and political connections tend to dominate. This has been its (poverty alleviation programmes) problem. I just wanted to raise this,” Suu Kyi told Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy.

The Anantpur district in Andhra Pradesh, where the implementation of MNREGS and PDS has been relatively successful, was supposed to be a show piece for the state government.

While Reddy quickly attempted to interject and justify the success of the schemes, Ramesh remained calm and accepted the Myanmar leader’s suggestions.

Brushing aside the Chief Minister, Ramesh told him, “You have not understood what she is asking. We honestly don’t have the answers to any of these questions. Let us not beat around the bush.”

Suu Kyi also took a keen interest in women’s participation in the rural job guarantee scheme.

“Has the attitude of women changed after these projects?” she asked, to which one of the women beneficiaries replied, “We do have a larger share in decision-making now.”

The Rural Development Minister however, admitted there were leakages in the MNREGS system. People are often not registered and even if they are registered, there are payment delays, he told the visiting leader.