There is a sharp impact of the pandemic and the successive stages of the lockdown on employment and income.
However, the recent experience with the pandemic suggests that the older schemes retain their utility and remain essential.
How is MGNREGS helping?
The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) is a demand-based scheme.
MGNREGS provides 100 days of guaranteed wage employment to rural unskilled labour.
Recently, it has seen a considerable upturn in the number of person-hours of work for which wages are due.
In May 2020, the number of person-days of work generated was 5% higher than the initial target.
In May 2019, for comparison, it was 10% lower.
So, the government has done well toincrease allocation on this.
The increased demand may not be only due to the economic shock in areas with a greater uptake of the MGNREGS.
It may be due to the reason that many areas will have received reverse migration from urban areas.
These returned migrants will need some form of employment.
Pending the development of real jobs, the MGNREGS is necessary to play a bridging role.
What could be done regarding MGNREGS?
The demand for MGNREGS wages is chronically higher than the supply due to inefficiencies in implementation.
Therefore, the increase in wages under the scheme by Rs 20 is the minimum that could have been expected.
The government must also move faster to settle the outstanding dues that are with the state governments on this account.
How did the PDS help?
The Public Distribution System (PDS) has clearly played a crucial role in preventing the spread of hunger across affected areas.
This is not to say that it does not continue to have holes.
Around 500 million Indians do not have cards under the National Food Security Act, and not all of them are middle-class.
The government must take action on several fronts to ensure the PDS continues to serve as effective relief.
What could be done regarding PDS?
Doubling the food rations can be sustained a little longer - at least till the harvest.
If universalising benefits is deemed too dangerous, then for this same length of time some other form of temporary access to the PDS should be devised — perhaps temporary ration cards.
States that are suffering the brunt of reverse migration should receive additional food grain access from central stores.
Fortunately, India has a vast reserve of food grain and there is no point trying to conserve it in times like these.
What is the conclusion?
These legacy programmes continue to have many problems.
They are not as efficient and corruption-free as many would like.
But the government has done well to use them to provide relief.
It should top up the funds and resources they need so that they continue to function as India returns to normalcy.
