Kolkata: A day after the Supreme Court upheld the Calcutta High Court’s directive asking the Centre to resume payments under the MGNREGA 100 Days’ Work scheme in West Bengal, Paschimbanga Khet Mazdoor Union and the state are learnt to have urged the High Court to expedite hearing in the pending cases related to the scheme.
The plea was made before the Division Bench of Acting Chief Justice Sujoy Paul and Justice Smita Das De, who assured that the matters would be taken up for hearing on November 7.
Several petitions concerning the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme are currently pending before the High Court. The request for an early hearing came in the wake of Monday’s Supreme Court order dismissing the Centre’s appeal against the High Court’s June 18 directive.
On June 18, the then Chief Justice’s Bench of the High Court had directed the Union government to restart the 100 Days’ Work scheme in West Bengal from August 1. The Centre challenged that order in the Supreme Court on July 31. The case was heard on October 27 by an apex court Bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta, which declined to interfere with the High Court’s decision. The rural employment scheme had been suspended in West Bengal since March 2022 following allegations of large-scale irregularities. The Centre’s decision to withhold funds led to a prolonged standoff between the state and the Union government, affecting thousands of rural labourers.