Agartala, December 20, 2025: The Tripura Pradesh Congress has strongly condemned the Centre’s decision to replace the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) with a new law, calling it a direct insult to the Father of the Nation.

Addressing a press conference in Agartala on Saturday, Congress MLA Sudip Roy Barman alleged that fundamentalist forces were behind the move to erase Gandhi’s name from the flagship rural employment scheme. “There is no difference between the fundamentalist forces in Bangladesh and those in India. Both represent religious extremism and intolerance,” he said.

Roy Barman explained that MGNREGA was designed to provide at least 100 days of guaranteed employment annually to rural households, particularly unskilled workers, thereby ensuring livelihood security and contributing to rural infrastructure development. “It was a social safety net aimed at reducing poverty and creating rural employment. But the Centre has scrapped it and, using its majority in Parliament, passed the ‘Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission Bill, 2025.’ This new law is anti-worker and disastrous,” he charged.

Highlighting the differences, he noted that under MGNREGA, any rural adult demanding work was legally entitled to employment within 15 days, failing which the government had to provide unemployment allowance. “This crucial safeguard has been removed in the new law. Workers’ rights are being curtailed in a calculated manner,” he said.

Drawing parallels with the farmers’ protests against the three controversial farm laws, Roy Barman asserted that the people of India would rise again in protest. “Just as the government was forced to repeal the farm laws under public pressure, the new employment law too will face nationwide resistance,” he declared.

The Pradesh Congress announced that it will launch statewide protests tomorrow against what it termed as a betrayal of rural workers and an affront to Mahatma Gandhi’s legacy.