The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) has been implemented in Sivasagar district from April 1 this year. With the Government of India deciding to extend NREGA to all rural areas of all the remaining districts in the country from April this year, Sivasagar district administration has taken up a set of tasks to become fully prepared to meet the challenges of the act. As part of the awareness generation activity about the act, a workshop was held at the conference hall of DRDA, Sivasagar recently. Dr Devadutta Barkotoky, Director of the State Resource Centre, who attended the workshop as the guest of honour, said that NREGA guarantees 100 days of employment to a local rural household if it demands it and is willing to do unskilled manual work. He also said that a family will be issued a job card within 15 days after they apply for it in writing or orally. "A job card is necessary for demanding employment under NREGA, which will be issued by the gram panchayat after verification', he said. He further said that if unemployment is not provided within 15 days of application unemployment allowance will be paid by the State Government. RP Baruah, Chief Executive Officer of Sivasagar Zila Parishad, GM Hazarika, Additional Deputy Commissioner, Dr Bichitra Das and Ranjit Buragohain spoke on the occasion as resource persons. All the speakers spoke on various provisions of the act. Hemo Gogoi, President of Sivasagar Zila Parishad, presided over the meeting and was attended among others by Rohiteswar Deori, Project Director of DRDA, Sivasagar, Md Ajijur Haque and representatives of gram panchayats of the district.