Once covered with lush teak forests, Pati block in Badwani district of Madhya Pradesh now has a depressing lunar landscape of denuded hills, where only subsistence agriculture is possible. Most rural households there survive on wage labour and seasonal migration. The Jagrut Adivasi Dalit Sangathan (JADS), an unregistered organisation with a membership of 3,500 families, has worked there for many years on issues concerning tribal land rights. Since the NREGA was launched in 2006, the JADS has struggled for workers