Patna, March 29: The rural development department has ordered the introduction of the statement of job head in the expenditures made under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA).

This comes after the department conceded that over 2 million fake job cards existed in Bihar.

Department secretary Amrit Lal Meena has issued the letter to the district magistrates (DMs) stating that the Centre had requested that statement of job be introduced in the management information system (MIS) used in MGNREGA under the head of employment status. “The move woudl ensure transparency,” he said in the letter, asking them to make available the statement of job of all MGNREGA labourers of 2012-13 by April this year. The DMs have been instructed to verify in May this year if those getting statement of job have actually worked under MGNREGA or not.

Department officials said the step would help detect fake job cards and curb ghost payment under MGNREGA, which has been under scrutiny for corruption. The statement of job is to be sent to each MGNREGA beneficiary who has received payment and would have details of the amount paid. “If the beneficiary, after receiving the statement of job says that he has not worked under MGNREGA and has not received payment, it means that the job card is fake,” said an official of the department.

Earlier this month, responding to a question inside the Assembly, rural development minister Nitish Mishra had indicated that of 1.27 crore job cards issued in Bihar, only around 45 lakh were actually being used. He had hinted that around 2 million job cards had either been duplicated or even triplicated. He said the department’s internal audit had detected fake job cards in Muzaffarpur and Darbhanga.

The department has also issued instructions to ensure that at least 50 per cent of expenditure under MGNREGA is done by panchayats instead of work being executed through block offices and zilla parishads. It has said panchayat bodies were entitled to give administrative approval of work up to Rs 5 lakh and has suggested that schemes under MGNREGA should be approved in panchayat body meetings and expenditures should be recorded in the MIS.