02 Jan 2023 National Mobile Monitoring System

National Mobile Monitoring System

This article covers “Daily current events “and the topic is “National Mobile Monitoring System” which is in news, It covers “Government policies and interventions” In GS-2 and the following content have relevance for UPSC.

For prelims: About the NMMS app

For mains: GS -2, Government policies and interventions

Why in news:

• The National Mobile Monitoring Software (NMMS) software aims to boost transparency and community supervision of NREGA projects. For NREGA employees, this presents considerable difficulties.
• The Ministry of Rural Development introduced the National Mobile Monitoring Software (NMMS) App in 2021.
• It attempted to increase transparency and make sure that the schemes were properly monitored.
• The Mahatma Gandhi NREGA workers in all the States and Union Territories are covered via the National Mobile Monitoring App.
• This software aims to increase transparency and guarantee proper scheme monitoring.
• The main function of the app is to snap a real-time, geotagged, photograph of each employee’s attendance once during each half of the day.
• The software aids in enhancing program citizen supervision.

Concerns on National Mobile Monitoring System

• While such an app would be helpful in tracking the attendance of employees with set work hours, in the majority of States, NREGA wages are determined based on the volume of work completed each day, so employees are not required to commit to set hours.
• Women are disproportionately affected by NREGA since historically there have been more women employed (54.7% in FY 2021-22) and because it has played a significant role in improving working conditions for women in rural areas.
• The app is expected to have an outsized impact on women employees because of the customary weight of caring for children and the home for women.
• Lack of a reliable network: The NMMS faces implementation problems as well. Real-time monitoring requires a reliable network, yet in parts of rural India, this network is still patchy.
• Impact on NREGA mates: The app has had a negative effect on NREGA Mates as well.
• The position of a Mate was envisioned as a way to empower local women to oversee attendance and productivity monitoring in their panchayat.
• A smartphone is a must for becoming a “Mate.”
• Numerous women who don’t own cell phones are no longer eligible to be Mates due to this new requirement.
• The loss of transparency: The application states that it will “improve citizen supervision” by “providing more openness and assuring adequate monitoring of the schemes, in addition to potentially facilitating payment processing faster.”
• Employees no longer have a physical record of their attendance that they may sign attesting to their attendance and work performance.
• Lack of transparency on corruption: Although the NMMS’s emphasis on real-time, geo-tagged attendance may be one method of combating this corruption, the MoRD has not been particularly transparent about the scope of this corruption or the means by which the NMMS combats it.
• No criteria have been set up to evaluate the app’s success in terms of either transparency or speedier payment processing.

Significance

• The NMMS App enables geo-tagged photos and real-time employee attendance tracking at Mahatma Gandhi NREGA labor sites.
• The software aids in enhancing program citizen supervision.

Way ahead:

• Social audits: In social audits, the panchayat’s residents directly participate in and influence how NREGA is implemented in their panchayat.

In the past, audits have been effective in giving local rights holders a voice in decisions and a way to hold the administration directly responsible.

Source:

• The Hindu 
• Netnrega

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