CDS (I) 2022 General Knowledge · Question 42 of 120

Correct — D, This is implemented only in rural areas of India. The Act's own title says rural, and its guarantee runs to rural households alone; there has never been a corresponding urban entitlement under it. Each of the other three statements misstates a well-known feature. The guarantee is of at least a hundred days of wage employment in a financial year, not a hundred and seventy-five, to one adult member of every rural household that volunteers. Wages are to be paid with gender equality rather than at a higher rate for women, although at least one-third of beneficiaries are to be women. And the work provided is unskilled manual work — that is the statutory description of what a job card entitles a person to demand.

• (a)It ensures 175 days of employment to needy persons in rural areas. — The number is wrong and so is the targeting. The guarantee is of at least one hundred days of wage employment in a financial year, and it goes to any rural household that volunteers for unskilled manual work, not only to those judged needy.
• (b)It gives higher wages to women workers. — The Act requires equal wages, not higher ones. What it does provide for women is a share of the work — at least one-third of the beneficiaries are to be women — together with worksite facilities such as creches.
• (c)People are generally given both skilled and unskilled jobs. — The entitlement is specifically to unskilled manual work, offered ordinarily within five kilometres of the applicant's residence and paid at the notified wage rate. Skilled and semi-skilled work appears only in the limited material-and-wage proportions permitted for a project, not as the entitlement.

The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act was passed on 23 August 2005 and came into force from 2 February 2006. It gave every rural household a legal right to demand at least a hundred days of unskilled manual work in a financial year, at the notified wage, ordinarily within five kilometres of home, with an unemployment allowance if work is not provided within fifteen days. Its second purpose was to create durable assets — water conservation, land development, rural connectivity. The Act was renamed after Mahatma Gandhi in 2009.

Three of the four options here can be knocked out by remembering single numbers or words, which is why this is a good example of a question that rewards precise recall rather than reasoning. A hundred days, not a hundred and seventy-five; equal wages with a one-third share for women, not higher wages; unskilled manual work, not a mix of skilled and unskilled. What survives is the plainest statement of all, and the one embedded in the Act's own name. Two things have moved since the 2022 exam and both are worth noting honestly. The scheme has always been the largest single line of India's rural employment spending, and its status changed at the end of 2025: Parliament passed the Viksit Bharat — Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Act, 2025 in December 2025, which replaces the 2005 Act with a reframed rural employment and livelihood guarantee under the Ministry of Rural Development. Candidates writing after that date should answer such an item on the 2005 Act as legal history rather than as current law.

• NREGA was passed on 23 August 2005 and implementation began on 2 February 2006; it was renamed MGNREGA in 2009.
• The guarantee is of at least one hundred days of wage employment in a financial year to one adult member of every rural household volunteering for unskilled manual work.
• Work is to be provided ordinarily within five kilometres of the residence, at the notified minimum wage, with wages paid on a basis of gender equality.
• At least one-third of the beneficiaries are to be women.
• In December 2025 Parliament passed the Viksit Bharat — Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Act, 2025, replacing the 2005 Act.

• Reading a hundred days as a per-person entitlement rather than a per-household one.
• Assuming that a one-third share of work for women means a higher wage for them.
• Treating the Act as covering urban unemployment, which it has never done.

As a which-statement-is-correct item on the Act's features, or as an eligibility question asking who may claim work under it.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005, the guarantee of employment in a financial year is available to

  • (a)every adult individual in a rural household
  • (b)one adult member of every rural household that volunteers for unskilled manual work
  • (c)only households below the poverty line
  • (d)only scheduled caste and scheduled tribe households

  Answer(b) One adult member of every rural household that volunteers for unskilled manual work — the entitlement is per household, and it is not restricted by income or social category.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  If employment is not provided within the stipulated period after a demand is made under the 2005 Act, the applicant becomes entitled to

  • (a)a free ration entitlement
  • (b)an unemployment allowance
  • (c)a skill training place
  • (d)a housing grant

  Answer(b) An unemployment allowance — payable by the State Government when work is not provided within fifteen days of the demand.