V.K.SHUKLA,J. - (1.) Bibhuti Kushwaha and six others are before this Court for quashing of the order dated 21.2.2017 issued by the Under Secretary of the State of U.P. along with the order dated 22.2.2017 issued by the Additional Commissioner, MGNREGA, Gram Vikas, U.P. informing the petitioners that the period of their functioning as Ombudsman has come to an end on 5.2.2017 and, accordingly, concerned District Magistrates should proceed to fill up the vacancies of Ombudsman in respect of their district.
(2.) Brief background of the case is that each one of the petitioner has been performing and discharging their duties as Ombudsman in different districts of State of U.P. To understand the agony of the petitioners, we proceed to examine and trace the history that contains the origin to the post of Ombudsman in the State of U.P. The Constitution of the country in 7th Schedule exercising the power as conferred under Article 246 of the Constitution of India has prescribed list under three heading i.e. List I (Union List), List II (State List) and List III (Concurrent List). Article 246 deals with the 'subject matter of laws made by Parliament and by the Legislatures of States'. Since the subject of welfare of labour comes within the heading of Concurrent List i.e. List III, wherein the power is entrusted to both the Parliament and State Legislature to form the laws. To achieve the object as being given in the Concurrent List an Act came into picture bearing nomenclature as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005 (hereinafter referred to as the "Act 2005"). The assent of the said Act was obtained by the President on 5.9.2005 and the same was published on 7.9.2005. The statement and object of the Act 2005 was given herein below: "Productive absorption of under employed and surplus labour force in the rural sector has been a major focus of planning for rural development. In order to provide direct supplementary wage employment to the rural poor through public works, many programmes were initiated by the Government of India, namely, National Rural Employment Programme (NREP), Rural Landless Employment Guarantee Programme (RLEGP) and Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY). Currently, Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojna (SGRY) is being implemented all over the country with the objective to provide supplementary wage employment in the rural areas, create durable rural infrastructure and to ensure food security. Though the SGRY is providing some relief to the rural poor, its reach has been inadequate in view of the dimension of the unemployment in rural areas. It has been observed that the scale of employment generation under SGRY in 2002-03 and 2003-04 was barely adequate to provide on an average 20 days of employment to each Below Poverty Line (BPL) household in the rural areas. Secondly, there is no guarantee that employment will be available to the rural households on demand as SGRY is an allocation based programmes. This situation of unemployment has been compounded by the absence of any social security mechanism. There is, therefore, an urgent need to ensure at least some minimum days of employment in the shape of manual labour to every household in the rural areas. Recognizing the urgent need to ensure a certain minimum days of wage employment, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government has declared in its National Common Minimum Programme (NCMP) that it "...... will immediately enact a National Employment Guarantee Act. This will provide a legal guarantee for at least 100 days of employment, to begin with on asset creating public works programmes every year at minimum wages for at least one able-bodied person in every rural, urban poor and lower middle class household." it is also necessary to empower the poor in the rural areas by appropriate enactment so that they can demand work on the strength of this legal entitlement."
(3.) Section 27 of the 2005 Act empowers the Central Government to give such directions as it may consider necessary to the State Government for the effective implementation of the provisions of this Act, for ready reference same is as follows: "27. Power of Central Government to give directions.- (1) The Central Government may give such directions as it may consider necessary to the State Government for the effective implementation of the provisions of this Act. (2) Without prejudice to the provisions of subsection (1), the Central Government may, on receipt of any complaint regarding the issue or improper utilisation of funds granted under this Act in respect of any Scheme if prima facie satisfied that there is a case, cause an investigation into the complaint made by any agency designated by it and if necessary,order stoppage of release of funds to the Scheme and institute appropriate remedial measures for its proper implementation within a reasonable period of time.";