MGNREGS: Political Economy, Local Governance and Asset Creation in South India

Any governmental policy or programme is envisaged and implemented in a particular institutional context. The specificities of the local-level institutions considerably influence the processes of planning and implementation, even if the programme is conceived beyond the local. This study aims to bring out the interplay between the regional- and local-level institutions and a centrally sponsored national-level programme. The dynamics of local-level institutions on the processes and outcomes is analyzed in this study. Exploring MGNREGS, the premier centrally sponsored rural employment programme, this study focuses on three aspects: the local-level governance capacity, local governance structure and the regional political economy in shaping the programme in South India. Much of the scholarship on MGNREGS has focused on its primary goal of employment creation, while scant attention has been directed to its equally important twin goal, rural asset creation for enhancing rural livelihood. This study, focusing on asset creation under MGNREGS, collected evidences from the four southern states, viz., Andhra Pradesh (erstwhile), Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala. A comparative analysis of the four states shows that the design of the scheme for asset creation is subject to considerably varied interpretations at the regional and sub-regional levels anchored on the above factors. Further, the type of projects selected and created, extent and nature of expenditure incurred, quality of assets created, and maintenance of assets were considerably affected by the structures of local governance, the interaction between the political class and the local governments, and the local manifestations of class–caste dynamics.