- Lok Sabha was informed about the significant increase in the number of MNREGA job card deletions in the financial year 2022-23 as compared to the previous year.
- A total of 1,49,51,247 MNREGA job cards were removed in 2021-22.
- However, in the financial year 2022-23, the number of deletions increased to 5,18,91,168 job cards, which is an astonishing growth of 247%.
States with high deletion numbers
- The maximum number of MGNREGA job cards were deleted in West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
- In West Bengal, the number of deleted job cards increased by over 5,000% from 1,57,309 in 2021-22 to 83,36,115 in 2022-23.
- Andhra Pradesh saw a significant increase of 1,147% in job card deletions, from 6,25,514 in 2021-22 to 78,05,569 in 2022-23.
- Telangana saw a substantial increase of 2,727% in job card deletions, from 61,278 in 2021-22 to 17,32,936 in 2022-23.
- Gujarat also saw a significant increase of over 200% in job card deletions, from 1,43,202 workers’ cards in 2021-22 to 4,30,404 in 2022-23.
Reason for removal
Several reasons were given for the removal of mgnrega job cards, including
- Fake job card
- Duplicate job card
- Workers are no longer ready to work
- Families shifting permanently from gram panchayat
- Dead labor