Among these, the most significant tool is promoting functional literacy. This is so because majority of the MGNREGA workers are illiterate, poor and at the bottom of the social hierarchy, they do not have either formal literacy skills to record their rights or to articulate their demands in a written form. This is why absence of written applications for employment, non-issuance of dated receipts, non-payment of unemployment allowances and compensation for delay in wage payment are a common practice.

The challenges laidout above call for a mechanism under MGNREGA implementation which can ensure functional literacy programme for the workers so that they can get employment on demand in writing and unemployment allowance in the case of non-allotment of work. Through such programme workers can also read their job cards and understand the different mode of money transaction either through banks or post offices. This will also help them calculate the amount of money they get against their work and simultaneously check any corrupt practices in the payment system.

Considering the requiremen of the programme, DA conducted a pilot exercise to promote functional literacy among MGNREGA women workers under the initiative NREGS II - Convergence project in seven Gram Panchayats (four GP in Baragaon block of Jhansi district and three GP in Niwari block of Tikamgarh distirct) of Bundelkhund region. The objective of this intervention was twofold – one, to enable 150 MGNREGA women workers to access basic entitlements under the scheme through TARA Akshar Literacy Package and two, to enable these women to effectively negotiate and claim their rights given as per the Indian Constitution.

The idea behind the selection of only women for this pilot intervention was that they are the most vulnerable section of our society. Schedule II of the MGNREGA also declares that priority shall be given to women under work allocation in such a way that at least one-third of the beneficiaries shall be women who have registered and requested for work under the Act. Keeping in mind the above mentioned aspects, identification of women was done in seven Gram Panchayats of Baragaon and Niwari blocks.

The package of both TARA Akshar and TARA Ganit is designed in a fashion which helps the workers achieve basic skills of reading and writing Hindi and basic methods of calculation within 60 days. Apart from this, it also includes audio-visual computer based reading package through which women can easily and quickly understand the lessons. The use of audio-visual technique assists them grasp the lessons within a short span of time. They are also taught to read job cards, count numbers of man-days worked, reading bank passbooks and calculating amount of money received in the account.

Apart from TARA Akshar Literacy Programme, these women are also made aware about MGNREGA and its salient features through narrow casting and broad casting with support of Community Radio, Bundelkhund. The tools and techniques used in the above process were illiterate friendly and easy to understand.

The programme succeeded in making 150 women literate in selected villages.

During the implementation of TARA Akshar Literacy Programme a pilot intervention of spreading literacy at MGNREGA worksite was carried out with the support of Panchayati Raj Institutions at Sarmau village. Firstly, an interface took place between the team from Development Alternatives and women working at the site of MGNREGA. During the interaction some questions were based to them. Some examples are: Are they able to write applications for job under MGNREGA? Are they able to read their job cards? Are they capable enough to count the number of days they have worked and amount received against it in their job cards? The answers to all the questions were in negative. All the women copmlained that they cannot demand work in writing because they were illiterate. ‘How can we count our wages if we can not recognise numbers?’, they asked. Thereafter, the importance of literacy was explained to them. The women were made aware of the benefits of functional literacy which was bound to contribute to their access to entitlement. They were also explained about the whole package of TARA Akshar and TARA Ganit. After a round of discussions, eight women agreed to attend the classes of TARA Akshar. These women came with a proposal that they can only attend classes between the period of rest during work at the worksite. Considering their demands a batch of eight women was started at the worksite of Sarmau called ‘Nala ka Sondhikaran: Check dam se School tak’ on May 11, 2010. All the women regularly showed their presence and completed the 60 days course. Now they are able to write names, read and understand job card entries, write application for jobs and much more. The thing that differentiates this adult literacy programme from all other literacy programmes is that this exercise was started at the worksite and the workers actively participated in it. This pilot intervention opened the possibilities of spreading functional literacy at the worksite of MGNREGA without hampering the work. A video documentation of the activity has also been made, examples of women attending classes of TARA Akshar at MGNREGA worksite.

The impact of the above study can be easily gauged as a group of women are now demanding jobs in writing from Panchayats. As a result of this literacy they do not want to just involve themselves under unskilled manual work of MGNREGA, rather they look forward to the work of skilled labourer now. They raised their concern of skilled jobs in a meeting with Chief Development Officer (CDO) of Jhansi when they were distributed certificates of TARA Akshar.

The study tells us that this intervention has not only made the women working under MGNREGA literate but also contributed in their social empowerment as they now deal with public affairs on their own, with confidence and conviction. q

Syed Taheer Ahmad
stahmad@devalt.org