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VB-GRAM G workers to get a minimum of ₹300 per day as wage rates notified by Centre

The Hindu – National

2h ago

VB-GRAM G workers to get a minimum of ₹300 per day as wage rates notified by Centre

Summary

Subscribed with another email? Representational file image. | Photo Credit: ARUN KULKARNI The Union government has fixed a floor wage of ₹300 per day under the Viksit Bharat-Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) (VB-GRAM G) Act, 2025, which came into effect on Tuesday, replacing the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), 2005. Other northern and northeastern States which saw wage hikes above 15% to reach the ₹300 level include Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Jharkhand, Assam, Tripura, Sikkim, and West Bengal. Barring the special rate of ₹450 applicable to certain gram panchayats in Sikkim, Haryana continues to have the highest wage rate at ₹409, but recorded one of the lowest increases of just 2.25%. Haryana (₹409), Goa (₹406) and Kerala (₹401) are the only States with wage rates above ₹400. Congress general secretary and former Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh criticised the notification, saying the wages remain “unjustifiably low”. He reiterated the Congress’s demand, made during the 2024 Lok Sabha campaign under its Shramik Nyay programme, for a national daily minimum wage of ₹400 for all workers in Indias, including MGNREGA workers. “The Expert Committee headed by Dr. Anoop Satpathy, set up by the Modi government, had also recommended a national minimum wage floor of ₹375 per day in 2019,” he said. Ramesh noted that the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Rural Development, chaired by Congress MP Saptagiri Ulaka, had also consistently recommended higher wages for MGNREGA workers. Given the “widespread minimum wage protests in industrial hubs like Noida, and at a time when the stagnation of rural wages is widely recognised as a key constraint on our economic growth”, the notification was both a “snub to India’s workers and an unwise economic policy,” he said. “A just minimum wage for India’s workers would adopt Dr.

From the source

Highest wage rate of ₹409/day in Haryana; 21 States/UTs with lower wage rates under MGNREGA see significant hikes to meet new VB-GRAM G floor rate; southern States with higher wages see minimal hikes

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CM Vijay urges PM to revise VB-GRAMG, says Tamil Nadu faces Rs 5,000 crore burden

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking significant changes to the implementation of the newly launched Viksit Bharat–Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) (VB-GRAMG) scheme, warning that its current funding structure would impose an additional financial burden of more than Rs 5,000 crore on the state. In a detailed letter, Vijay urged the Centre to revisit the scheme's funding pattern and operational guidelines before its implementation, arguing that several provisions could adversely affect rural employment and the state's welfare programmes. He further cautioned that unless the Centre modified certain provisions of the VB-GRAMG Act, 2025, "the seamless and effective execution of this scheme on the ground would suffer significantly and will affect the rural population which is dependent on the rural employment programme." A key demand in Vijay's letter is the restoration of a more favourable Centre-State funding pattern. The Chief Minister raised concerns over the new 60:40 funding ratio across wage, material and administrative components, arguing that it marked a sharp departure from the structure followed under the MGNREGS for nearly two decades. "As MGNREGS operated under a different structure for two decades, this abrupt shift places an unsustainable strain on the State exchequer, which may reduce available wage employment days or crowd out other essential welfare schemes," the letter states. Vijay requested the Centre to retain 100 per cent Central funding for wage and administrative expenses while adopting a 75:25 Centre-State sharing pattern for material costs. "I therefore request that 100% funding be maintained for the Wage and Administrative components, with the Material component shared on a 75:25 basis between the Government of India and the Government of Tamil Nadu," he wrote. Vijay also sought greater flexibility in notifying peak agricultural seasons, saying the existing provision requiring a pre-declared 60-day suspension period for employment works was impractical given changing climatic conditions. In the concluding part of his letter, Vijay appealed to the Centre to continue the rural employment programme under Mahatma Gandhi's name, saying the title carries immense historical significance and public goodwill. Vijay said Tamil Nadu has consistently been among the leading states in implementing rural employment guarantee programmes and expressed hope that the Centre would favourably consider the proposed changes to ensure the scheme delivers maximum benefits to rural communities while protecting the state's finances.

Jobs & Hiring4h ago

Rapid demand for AI datacentres in Australia could stoke inflation, experts warn – and crowd out land for housing

Calls are growing for new datacentre approvals to be halted until stronger protections are considered Get our breaking news email , free app or daily news podcast T ransport for NSW and the Reserve Bank have warned datacentres could take scarce land from logistics firms and housing developments, pushing up prices and overheating the economy, as calls grow for a national pause on the booming sector. The rapid growth of datacentres has raised concerns for the transport and logistics sector, with Transport for NSW telling the state parliament inquiry on datacentres there was already significant pressure on the availability of industrial land and infrastructure. The transport department agency said in a submission that freight and logistics companies depended on industrial land near markets and transport. “The shortage of land is causing major freight and logistics operators to leave Sydney . They are relocating their main centres to Brisbane or Melbourne where suitable land is available and less expensive,” it said. Transport for NSW acknowledged the industrial land vacancy rate had improved nationally and in Sydney in the past few years, but it was still “well behind international rates and below the ideal market level”. “The increasing demand on freight, from both increasing population and changing consumer patterns, will continue to drive the need for more industrial land for high volume logistics handling, and localised distribution centres across Sydney,” a spokesperson said. Transport for NSW warned that fragmentation of freight activities due to competing land uses could result in increased costs for business and higher prices for consumers, and said government needed coordinated policy to manage land use strategically. Commercial and industrial building approval values hit a record high in May because of new datacentre projects, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported on Wednesday. The board discussed the risk the buildout could make skills shortages worse – construction costs were already high and workers in short supply before datacentre builds began hiring. Three communities in NSW, Victoria and Western Australia that Guardian Australia has previously reported on have allied to call on state and federal governments to halt approval of new datacentre developments until stronger protections for communities, cultural heritage and the environment are considered. The federal Labor backbencher Ed Husic also raised concerns about datacentres taking up land that might otherwise be used for housing. “There’s been a bit of a frenzy going on with datacentre builds … Land gets snapped up that should have been set aside for houses, and we’ve already got 90,000 workers short in construction,” he told Sky News on Tuesday. “So if we are having a situation where datacentres are now taking up land for homes, we’ve got to pump the brakes on this.” The assistant minister for the digital economy, Andrew Charlton, said the government’s top priority was building new homes. “States and councils need to prioritise housing in their local planning decisions,” he said. “The collective task of policymakers is to ensure investment in datacentres work in the interests of Australians, not the other way around.” Dennett said communities deserved a genuine say in what got built around them but a moratorium was the wrong tool. “Datacentres in Australia are already assessed through rigorous, independent planning that requires environmental assessment, community consultation, cultural heritage protection and binding conditions of approval, and they can only be built on industrial and employment land,” she said. “A blanket pause would freeze the whole industry to legislate safeguards that for the most part already exist, while sending the investment, the jobs and the local infrastructure these projects bring to other countries.”

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VB-GRAM G workers to get a minimum of ₹300 per day as wage rates notified by Centre

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