New Delhi [India], December 15 : Senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Monday called the Central Government's draft bill to replace the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee scheme (MGNREGA) "unfortunate", saying that the concept of Gram Swaraj and the ideal of Ram Rajya were never competing forces.
This comes as the Central government is set to introduce the Viksit Bharat-Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevil Mission (Gramin) Bill, 2025, to replace the MGNREGA scheme.
Tharoor said that removing Mahatma Gandhi's name from the scheme is a dishonour to his legacy, whose final breath was a testament to Lord Ram.
"The controversy over renaming MGNREGA in the Govt's proposed new G-RAM-G Bill is unfortunate. The concept of Gram Swaraj and the ideal of Ram Rajya were never competing forces; they were the twin pillars of Gandhiji's consciousness," Shashi Tharoor said in a post on X.
"Replacing the Mahatma's name in a scheme for the rural poor ignores this profound symbiosis. His final breath was a testament to 'Ram'; let us not dishonour his legacy by creating a division where none existed," he added.
The Viksit Bharat-Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevil Mission (Gramin) Bill, 2025, aims to envision aligning rural development with the Viksit Bharat 2047 vision, focusing on empowerment, growth, convergence and saturation to build a prosperous and resilient rural Bharat.
Under the bill, public works will be aggregated to form the Viksit Bharat National Rural Infrastructure Stack, prioritising water security, core rural infrastructure, livelihood-related projects, and climate-resilient initiatives. It also aims to ensure adequate farm-labour availability during peak agricultural seasons and to institutionalise Viksit Gram Panchayat Plans for integrated, saturation-driven planning.
These plans will be linked with PM Gati Shakti, powered by geospatial systems digital public infrastructure, and district- and state-level planning mechanisms.
The bill mandates a modern digital governance framework that incorporates biometric authentication, GPS and mobile-based monitoring, real-time dashboards, proactive disclosures and Artificial Intelligence tools for planning, auditing, and fraud risk mitigation.
The major definitions under the bill include adult members (aged one year or older), households, Blocks, implementing agencies, unskilled manual work, and the Viksit Gram Panchayat Plan.
The legislation also establishes Central and State Grameen Rozgar Guarantee Councils, as well as National and State-level Steering Committees to oversee implementation.