Patna, Dec. 1: A number of trade unions and non-government organisations, working for Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act schemes in villages, have questioned the state government’s decision to make payment through bank accounts in the absence of proper infrastructure.

“We demand that the government rolls back its decision of making payments under MNREGA only through bank accounts from February 1, 2013. It can create problems in implementation because of the poor banking infrastructure in the state,” said Ashish Ranjan, the state convener of National Alliance of People’s Movement.

On his opposition to payments through banks, he explained that the spread and reach of banking infrastructure is still weak in the state.

Referring to the report prepared by the Centre for Environment and Food Security, New Delhi, an NGO, which said Rs 6,000 crore had been siphoned off in the state in the past six years, Ranjan said the government’s probe is unsatisfactory. The rural development department ordered an investigation after the chief minister received complaints of irregularities in the implementation of MNREGA.

Many trade unions and NGOs, including Jan Jagran Shakti Sangathan, NAPM, Sahaj, MNREGA Watch Muzaffarpur, Musahar Vikas Manch, Mahila Vikas Manch and Lok Parishad, are unhappy with the government’s apathetic attitude towards the implementation of MNREGA schemes, he added.

Stressing the need for setting up an independent social audit directorate by February 2013, Ranjan said the state government has lost “political will” to implement MNREGA in the true spirit. “Had it been serious, the government would have set up social audit directorate. In Araria, after a series of social audits, the level of corruption came down from 79 per cent in 2009-10 to 49,” he said.

Nilam Kumari from Daudpur Simri panchayat at Bihta in Patna district alleged that around 1,000 people who work under the said scheme did not get wages.