Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan - Scheme to Provide Employment to Millions of Migrant Workers

With the Economy of India badly affected due to the COVID-19 pandemic add the loss of jobs for lakhs of migrant workers during the lockdown, a scheme by the name of 'Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan' or 'Rural Job Scheme' was launched by the Honourable Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi in the district of Bihar on 2oth June 2020 to cope up with this problem. The scheme will support migrant workers and other rural workers by giving them jobs and livelihood support. The scheme was launched by the PM via video conferencing. The Chief Minister of Bihar, Nitish Kumar was also present at the video conference when the scheme was launched.

After the scheme was launched, Nitish Kumar informed the PM that he interacted with the migrant workers who came back to their homes in Bihar during the lockdown. He said that the workers now want to work in Bihar only and do not want to leave as migrant workers to other states. He also said that the scheme will be greatly beneficial for these workers and that it is a gift from the Central Government to them. He also promised to include these workers in other schemes of the Bihar State Government.

How the Scheme Came Into Existence?
What Will the Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan Provide?
Benefits of Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan

How the Scheme Came Into Existence?

Prime Minister, Narendra Modi interacted with some of these migrant workers and tried to understand the problems that they are currently facing. According to Prime Minister Modi, he got the idea from migrant workers that were quarantined in a school building in Unnao, Uttar Pradesh. Instead of wasting their time, they utilized their skills and painted the whole school as an act of gratitude. The PM addressed all the migrant workers of Bihar and informed them that they will be getting jobs in their own state under the scheme, and urged them to use their talents and skills for taking their villages forward and for the overall development of Bihar.

What Will the Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan Provide?

The scheme will provide 125 days of employment under 25 sub-schemes to the migrant workers of 116 districts. These 116 districts are spread across 6 states including Bihar. The other states are Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, and Odisha. The scheme aims to provide guaranteed employment to about 6.7 million migrant workers.

The scheme will mainly focus on the development in rural areas. It will contain projects such as the building of roads, the building shelters for animals, drinking water supply, house constructions, the building of community toilets, and more in which the workers will be employed. The scheme has been launched with a budget of ₹50,000 Crores which is roughly half the budget for the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), previously known as the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) which aims to provide 100-day employment to almost 140 million workers of rural areas. Some of the state governments have requested to increase the employment period to 150 days to provide jobs to many workers who have returned to their native places all over the country amid the lockdown. In 2021-2022 the budget of th scheme increased and become ₹98,000. In 2022, total 3.62 billion person days of work were provided.
The MGNREGA has seen a sharp rise in the number of people applying for jobs since May, the reason that many people have lost their jobs due to the lockdown. The new 'Rural Jobs Scheme' or the 'Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan' will help overcome the unemployment in rural areas to a large extent. This scheme will also give a boost to the Indian economy which is currently at a standstill. It will help many workers by giving them employment in their own states.

Benefits of Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan

Some of the benefits of Garib Kalyan Roazgar Abhiyan schme are:

• It will create employment opportunities for migrants.
• It will create good infrastructure and the rural area will experience developement.
• There are number of different works that are given to the workers according to their skill and they will have employment for 125 days.
• The rural livelihood will experience a development with the help of the scheme.

FAQs

When was Garib Kalyan Rojgar Abhiyaan launched?

Garib Kalyan Rijgar Abhiyaan was launched in 20 June 2020.

Who launched Garib Kalyan Rojgar Yojana?

Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Garib Kalyan Rojgar Yojana.

What is Garib Kalyan Rojgar Yojana?

Garib Kalyan Rojgar Yojana is a scheme that will provide migrants and rural workers with job or livelihood for 125 days.