Amid reports of financial irregularities in the implementation of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS), the
Centre is setting up mechanism to fight corruption at the grassroot level by roping in chartered accountants and state auditor generals. The
corruption watchdog at the local and state levels would function under the overall instruction of the CAG.
Union minister of state for rural development Pradeep Jain “Aditya”, while speaking to this newspaper, said that his ministry has got the consent
of the law ministry in the change of rules for auditing the spending under MNAREGA to curb corruption at the grassroot level.
“At the local levels where the director (fund) is not available, the accounts at the village level will be audited by the CAs. At the state levels
the auditor generals have to create an auditing cell to audit the spendings under the MNAREGA in their respective states,” said Mr Jain, while
adding that the mechanism would be rolled out at a meet on Pune on July 18.
As per the scheme of things to plug in the leakage in the MNAREGA, the ministry is adopting two pronged strategies by getting the accounts at the
village level first vetted by civil society in the form of social auditing and then by the state level cells with overall supervision of the CAG,
added Mr Jain.
“The social audits of the MNAREGA spending will be submitted to the state level audit cells. This mechanism will effectively curb any form of
financial irregularities in the implementation of the flagship schemes at the grassroot level,” said the minister.