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Rural workers’ groups warn that under the new Viksit Bharat-Guarantee for Rozgar & Aajeevika Mission (Gramin), states may shoulder up to 90% of costs despite a legal 60:40 Centre-state promise.
Interim central allocations reportedly fund far fewer than the guaranteed 125 days of work, forcing states to plug massive gaps or risk undermining the employment guarantee.
State governments may have to bear up to nearly 90 per cent of the cost of implementing the new Viksit Bharat-Guarantee for Rozgar & Aajeevika Mission (Gramin) Act in some cases, far higher than the 40 per cent envisaged under the law, according to claims by rural workers’ groups in a press statement on June 17, 2026.
The Act, which replaced the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act after being passed by Parliament on December 19, 2025, promises 125 days of guaranteed employment. It says the Union government will bear 60 per cent of the total cost, while states will contribute 40 per cent. Himalayan states and Union Territories are exempt from this cost-sharing provision.
But the NREGA Sangharsh Morcha and the Foundation for Responsive Governance said proposed interim allocations by the Centre would fund far fewer days of work than promised, leaving states to meet the remaining cost if they want to provide 125 days of employment. The groups cited Union Ministry of Rural Development's At a Glance report accessed on June 15, 2026.
According to their analysis, Haryana and Maharashtra could end up bearing 89 per cent and 88 per cent of the total cost respectively if they fund the full 125-day guarantee. In Haryana, the Centre has proposed an allocation of Rs 984 crore, of which Rs 590 crore would come from the Union government and Rs 393 crore from the state.
The groups said this would provide only about 23 days of employment to 4.85 lakh job-card holders. To provide the remaining 101 days of employment, Haryana would need to spend an additional Rs 5,353 crore, they said. This would take the state’s effective share to about 89 per cent of total spending.
The analysis said Maharashtra would need to allocate an additional Rs 31,013 crore. Uttar Pradesh would need Rs 27,987 crore, Tamil Nadu Rs 27,212 crore and Rajasthan Rs 22,549 crore. It said Meghalaya and Tamil Nadu would effectively bear 81 per cent of total costs, Jharkhand 80 per cent, and Andhra Pradesh 66 per cent. None of the states examined would remain within the stated 40 per cent share, the groups said.
Laavanya Tamang, senior researcher at the Foundation for Responsive Governance and affiliated with the NREGA Sangharsh Morcha, said the allocations did not reflect the government’s promise of an “enhanced” employment guarantee.
She said the proposed funding would not provide even the 100 days of work earlier promised under MGNREGA in several states.
“As per our analysis, Andhra Pradesh would be able to generate only 42.35 person-days per active job card, Chhattisgarh only 39.07 person-days, Bihar only 30.94 person-days and Karnataka only 26.44 person-days,” she said.
She said Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh would be able to generate only 25.66 and 27.50 person-days respectively. Maharashtra and Haryana would generate the least employment, at 14.40 and 13.78 person-days.
Nikhil Dey of the NREGA Sangharsh Morcha said the new law should be withdrawn and MGNREGA restored in a strengthened form.
“The central government has fixed these interim allocations and is demanding that state governments allocate 40 per cent of programme funds months after state budgets have been passed,” he said.
He said states would have to make special provisions to implement the scheme.
“If the states do not allocate funds, the Centre will not be liable to provide funds under the new provisions. This will defeat the purpose of an employment guarantee,” he said.
The groups also said the draft VB-GRAMG rules do not specify the wage rate payable to workers.
They said this omission comes at a time when workers across several states have been demanding higher wages and more dignified work conditions.
“If the government truly intended VB-GRAMG to strengthen workers’ rights, it had a clear opportunity to explicitly guarantee payment of statutory minimum wages in the draft rules,” the NREGA Sangharsh Morcha said in a statement.
The group said a rights-based guarantee cannot be replaced by what it called an underfunded scheme. “An employment guarantee without adequate funding is not a guarantee at all,” it said.
