Madhya Pradesh tops the list of states with the amount of funds spent in the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. However, this statistic hides the grim reality that most of these funds are not really going to the poor in need of them and neither are they being spent to create assets that will promote sustainable use of natural resources in the rural areas. The old nexus between the bureaucrats and the politicians has succeeded in siphoning off funds while the accounts remain in order. The only way to check this is through the conduct of transparent social audits but this is being avoided like the plague by the government and the few social audits that are being done are all manipulated ones.
Kemat of Khedut Mazdoor Chetna Sangath in Kakrana village in Jhabua district has challenged this blatant misuse of funds and as a consequence has come under fire from the sarpanches and the bureaucracy. This is the typical story everywhere. Last year the Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan in Barwani district tried to do the same only to become the target for attacks not only from the corrupt sarpanches but also from the administration which lodged false cases against its activists. In fact the whole history of the many mass organisations of the adivasis in western Madhya Pradesh has been sprinkled with repression to suppress their opposition to corruption.
Under the circumstances one has to sadly conclude that the poor in this country will always remain so given the evil nature of the forces ranged against them.
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