'Attack on poor': Sonia criticises PM Modi over VB-G RAM G Bill; slams renaming MGNREGA

NEW DELHI: Congress Rajya Sabha subordinate Sonia Gandhi, reacting to the VB-G RAM G Bill, criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi, accusing the cardinal authorities of attacking the interests of the mediocre by "running a bulldozer implicit MGNREGA".Sonia Gandhi alleged that the Modi government, implicit the past 11 years, has "consistently tried to weaken MGNREGA by neglecting the interests of the agrarian unemployed, the mediocre and the marginalised, adjacent though the strategy proved to beryllium a lifeline for these sections during the Covid crisis".

"While the Congress played a large relation successful bringing MGNREGA into beingness and implementing it, the strategy was ne'er astir a governmental party.

It was astir nationalist involvement and nationalist welfare. By weakening this law, the Modi authorities has attacked the interests of crores of farmers, workers and landless agrarian poor," the erstwhile Congress main claimed.

The Rajya Sabha MP further said: "The Congress had a large publication successful bringing and implementing MGNREGA. It was a strategy connected to the involvement of the state and the people. The Modi authorities has attacked the interests of the mediocre done this."

'VB-G Ram G' bill, which awaits the President's nod, was passed amid fierce protestation by the opposition, peculiarly the INDIA bloc during the Winter Session of the Parliament.On Thursday, agrarian improvement curate Shivraj Singh Chouhan, speaking successful favour of the bill, claimed that the authorities improves substantially connected MGNREGA, which was "riddled" by corruption and inefficiency.The absorption was demanding that the measure beryllium sent to a parliamentary committee for scrutiny and assailed the authorities for removing Mahatma Gandhi's sanction from the agrarian employment warrant scheme.As Chouhan began his reply aft Congress MP KC Venugopal's request for sending Viksit Bharat-Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission-Gramin (VB-G RAM G) Bill to the committee went unheeded, absorption members trooped into the well, tore its copies and continued their protestation till the House passed the bill.The authorities has repealed the two-decade-old Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) with different legislation, titled the Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) (VB–G RAM G) Bill, 2025.The measure seeks to regenerate the MGNREGA with a revamped model aimed astatine aligning agrarian employment and improvement with the nationalist imaginativeness of Viksit Bharat 2047.What is VB–G RAM G?The Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Act, 2025 represents a large overhaul of MNREGA. Under the projected law, the authorities "establishes a modern statutory model aligned with Viksit Bharat 2047, guaranteeing 125 days of wage employment per agrarian household whose big members unpaid to bash unskilled manual work," arsenic per a connection released.ALSO READ | MGNREGA to beryllium replaced with VB–G Ram G: What it is and however it’s antithetic — cardinal FAQs answered