Ambala, December 19: The Communist Party of India (Marxist) has strongly opposed the Developed India – Employment and Livelihood Guarantee Mission (Rural) Bill, 2025. The party says that this bill abolishes the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005 (MNREGA) and snatches away the legal right of rural laborers.
CPI(M) leader Satish Sethi said that despite the opposition of all opposition parties in Parliament, the BJP passed this bill using its majority. He reminded that the MNREGA law was enacted in 2005 after extensive deliberations by a Joint Parliamentary Committee and with the consensus of all parties. In contrast, the new law disregards the interests of the laborers.
Sethi questioned why the government is abolishing the right to employment when rural laborers have long been demanding 200 days of employment guarantee, a daily wage of Rs. 800, implementation of MNREGA in urban areas, and linking it to agriculture. He termed the government's claim of providing 125 days of work as mere rhetoric, stating that in the last 12 years, the BJP government has not even been able to provide 100 days of work.
He said that under the new law, there will be no guarantee of work for all rural laborers. Work will only be available in villages notified by the central government, and the unemployment allowance has also been abolished. This will make the guarantee of employment dependent on the government's discretion.
The CPI(M) alleges that this bill transforms a rights-based law into a scheme, thereby depriving laborers of their civil rights and reducing them to mere beneficiaries. Furthermore, changing the expenditure ratio to 60:40 will place a heavy financial burden on the states, which will directly affect rural laborers.
The party has demanded the immediate withdrawal of this anti-labor bill and announced that left-wing parties and labor organizations will hold protests across the country on December 22 against it.