The Ministry of Rural Development continuously strives to ensure the transparent and effective implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act so that the rural households get benefitted from the provisions of the Act. MGNREGA has a huge reach covering 2.69 lakh Gram Panchayats across the country with over 26 Crore registered workers.

As per Para 2 of Schedule II of the Act, “It shall be the duty of the Gram Panchayat, after making such enquiry as it deems fit, to issue a job card within fifteen days from the date of receipt of such application containing therein a unique job card number with details of the registered number, insurance policy number and the Aadhaar numbers, if any.”

Further, Para 3 of Schedule II stipulates that “job cards are renewed after five years following due verification.” These activities related to Job cards like issuance, verification, and renewal etc, are the responsibility of the State Governments through Panchayat Raj Institutions like Gram Panchayats.

Job card verification is a continuous process, whereas job card renewal is required to be done once in 5 years. To simplify and support these statutory processes, States/UTs have been requested to utilize the e-KYC feature already available in the NMMS app (National Mobile Monitoring System) for job card verification and subsequent renewal after following extant processes.  This facilitative measure is intended to assist States in completing verification in a timely, transparent, and efficient manner. As 99.67% active workers’ Aadhar have already been seeded, e-KYC feature could be used as a simple, reliable, accurate and efficient way of verification of job cards. During e-KYC, the Gram Rojgar Sahayak/ Worksite supervisor/Mate/ any other GP level functionary captures a picture of the MGNREGA worker (through the NMMS App e-KYC feature) which is digitally/automatically verified with his/her Aadhar details in real time. The entire process for one worker gets completed under a minute. States have been advised to take necessary measures to make the process as smooth as possible by resolving issues like network connectivity etc.  e-KYC can be done anywhere as decided by the State such as- at worksite, special camps organised by the Gram Panchayat etc. This is a progressive step aimed at strengthening transparency, efficiency, and ease of service delivery under the Mahatma Gandhi NREGA. The States and the ground level functionaries have been adequately oriented, sensitised and trained through various fora to make the verification process as smooth as possible. So far e-KYC for more than 56% active workers has been completed by the States.

The Ministry remains firmly committed to ensuring transparency and accountability in the implementation of the Scheme at field level and to safeguarding the rights of every genuine worker so that they continue to receive their rightful wage employment under the Act without any disruption.

As far as deletion of job cards/workers is concerned, a detailed Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) was issued by the Ministry on 24 January 2025. This SOP provides clear, uniform, and transparent guidelines for States to follow, ensuring fairness, accountability, and protection of workers’ interests in the management of job card records. Adequate safeguards have been made part of the SOP to prevent arbitrary/wrongful deletion. While ensuring strict adherence to the SOP is the responsibility of the State Governments, the Ministry closely monitors the same.

The Ministry remains committed to ensuring that all willing rural households are empowered to avail the entitlements under MGNREGA, while maintaining transparency, accountability and effectiveness.

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MS

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