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The Supreme Court of India on October 27, 2025 upheld the Calcutta High Court’s June judgment directing the Union government to resume works under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) in West Bengal.
The High Court had, on June 18, 2025, ordered the Centre to restore the scheme—which guarantees 100 days of work to rural households—from August 1, observing that “the scheme of the Act does not envisage a situation where it would be put to cold storage for eternity.”
However, neither the central nor the state government took steps to implement the order. Instead, the Centre approached the Supreme Court and repeatedly sought adjournments, delaying justice and depriving workers of their rightful entitlements, according to a statement by the Paschim Banga Khet Majoor Samity (PBKMS), the trade union that petitioned the court.
The Centre had suspended payments to MGNREGS workers in West Bengal from December 21, 2021, and stopped issuing work permits from March 2022. This halt affected nearly 25 million workers across the state, said advocate Purbayan Chakraborty, who represented PBKMS.
“The Supreme Court’s decision restores not just employment, but also confidence in the rule of law, democratic accountability, and the dignity of workers,” Chakraborty told Down To Earth.
Calling it a “historic victory” in the fight for the right to work and livelihood, Anuradha Talwar, convenor of the NREGA Sangharsh Morcha (NSM) in West Bengal, said, “The apex court has correctly dealt with the spiteful actions of the central government, which had more to do with political calculations and less with legality.”
Talwar said much had changed in the three years since the suspension. “We now face a three-pronged attack on NREGA — the use of technology, which makes it harder for people to access work and wages; entrenched corruption in West Bengal, where the ruling Trinamool Congress uses NREGA funds for elections and personal gain; and the Centre’s miserly reluctance to provide funds for millions of unemployed people across the country,” she alleged.
She added that unemployment had worsened during the stoppage of work. “Men have migrated to other villages, but women still want work. We already have over 10,000 applications filed, and unions of other left parties have submitted thousands more,” she said.
Chakraborty said the Supreme Court’s dismissal of the Union government’s appeal marked a decisive victory for Bengal’s rural workers and a strong affirmation that the right to work cannot be denied or delayed.
The directives followed the dismissal of the plea filed by the Centre.
