Govt approves 125-day rural job bill to replace MGNREGA

The government is likely to introduce a Bill in the ongoing Winter session of Parliament amending the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), changing the name of the flagship rural employment scheme to “Pujya Bapu Gramin Rozgar Yojana”.

According to senior government functionaries, the amended Bill was cleared by the Union Cabinet in its meeting held on Friday (December 12, 2025). There was no official announcement on the proposal at the cabinet briefing addressed by Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw. The original Bill passed by Parliament on August 25, 2005 was called “National Rural Employment Guarantee Act”. The suffix “Mahatma Gandhi” was added in 2009.

The flagship rural employment scheme guarantees up to 100 days of wage employment in every financial year to every household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. The sources also indicated that the government plans to increase this to 125 days.