| Date 10-Jun-2010 to 16-Jun-2010 |
Location India |
Format International |
Vietnamese Delegation Visit India to Study MGNREGA and BRGF Implementation
PRIA and UNDP hosted a 16-member delegation from the Government of Vietnam who were on a study tour of India from 10-16 June 2010. The delegation conducted study tours to understand India’s approaches towards addressing poverty and backwardness through the Backward Regions Grant Fund (BRGF) and the Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). The delegation comprised officials from the Vietnam Committee for Ethnic Minority Affairs, Cooperative Economy Department and the District People’s Committees among others.
Aimed at briefing the delegates on the concepts of BRGF and MGNREGS and how they can address rural poverty, a series of deliberations were held at the Indian Islamic Centre on the first day (Thursday, 10 June) of their visit. The team also got an opportunity to interact with members of the Ministry of Panchayati Raj and UNDP professionals.
The delegation visited PRIA on the second day (Friday, 11 June) and through the sessions tried to develop greater clarity on the aspects of decentralised planning and convergence as important components of the schemes. Resource persons from PRIA facilitated the sessions.
The team left for a two-day field trip of Bihar. On the first day (Monday, 14 June), resource persons from the Bihar team shared PRIA’s experience of working on the BRGF at the grassroots level in collaboration with the state government. The second day (Tuesday, 15 June) of their visit was devoted to gaining first hand experience of the working of a Panchayat. The delegates visited Phulwari Sharif block of Patna district and met the Sarpanch who shared his experiences of working on the implementation of the BRGF and MGNREGA. The team engaged in a discussion on a wide range of topics like the pattern of allocation of funds to the Panchayat, status of school education, electricity supply, migration to cities, annual crop yield and total land ownership of the gram Panchayat among others.
During their stay, the delegates also met the Chairperson of the District Planning Committee, the Director of the Panchayati Raj Department who briefed them on the working of the BRGF in 37 districts of the state and the Block Development Officer who talked about the challenges they face while working with Panchayats.
On the last day of their vist, Rajya Sabha MP and Former Panchayati Raj Minister of India, Mani Shankar Aiyer was invited to share his experiences of poverty alleviation programmes with the delegates in the India Habitat Centre. The focus of the interaction was on the role played by local governments in implementing programmes and how devolution of powers at local level is critical in delivering basic services to the poor and marginalised. The delegates also shared their experience of the field visit. The resource persons for the sessions were Mani Shankar Aiyer, B.K. Sinha (IAS), Secretary, Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India and Dr Rajesh Tandon, President, PRIA.
To know more about PRIA’s work on MGNREGA,please click here www.pria.org/index.php/events/past-events/icalrepeat.detail/2010/06/10/152/-/vietnamese-delegation-visit-india-to-study-mgnrega-and-brgf