New Delhi, Feb. 2: Two districts in Bengal were today given awards for excellence in implementing the national rural job scheme at an event where Congress chief Sonia Gandhi contradicted the Left’s claim on the employment guarantee act.

Burdwan and North 24-Parganas were among 25 districts chosen for the award for the year 2009.

The Left has always claimed that the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act was its contribution to the first UPA government before withdrawing support over the US nuclear deal, but Sonia today said the NREGA reflected the Congress’s ideology.

She said the idea of introducing such a scheme was first discussed during a meeting of Congress chief ministers in Assam in 2002.

“It reflects the Congress party’s commitment to the aam aadmi (common man),” Sonia told the Mahatma Gandhi NREGA Sammelan here.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the NREGA was a path-breaking scheme that acted as a social security net and had helped the poor cope with the effects of the economic slowdown.

But both Singh and Sonia admitted there had been lapses like delayed payment of wages.

Aruna Roy and Jean Dreze, among the original architects of the NREGA, did not attend the programme. Both had written to the rural development minister protesting against the construction of Bharat Nirman Rajiv Gandhi Sewa Kendra across panchayats using NREGA funds.

“This is a dangerous step towards displacement of labour-intensive NREGA works by material-intensive works,” they said in the letter, adding that it could be a new entry point for “exploitative and corrupt contractors”.