Why workers in rural Jharkhand are wary of the new VB-G RAM G programme

In May 2025, Maini Oraeen fell sick while she was working in searing heat in her village of Murkuni, in Jharkhand’s Ranchi district. The 51-year-old was unwell for a week, and then died.

Oraeen had been allocated the work of building wells under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. “My mother used to do MGNREGA work every year,” said her only son, Vishwanath Oraon. “The work she did was a lifeline for us in the summer months, where there is not much else we can do.”

He added, “It was not her time to die yet.”

Oraon’s description of the work as a “lifeline” despite the fact that his mother fell fatally sick while engaged in it is a poignant reminder of just how much rural India relies on the programme.

This reliance has come into even sharper focus in the months since December 2025, when the union government passed the Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) or the VB-G RAM G act. The new law replaces MGNREGA, which was enacted by the United Progressive Alliance government and has been operational since 2006.

The shift has activists, experts and workers worried – they fear that it will be accompanied by an overall reduction in the allocation of...

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