Alleging that the State government is intentionally delaying the job card distribution procedure under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), the Sadou Assam Gramin Shramik Sanstha said that the rural people are being cheated in the name of the scheme. Addressing a press meet recently, the general secretary of the association Arup Kumar Mahanta said that the scheme is being exploited both by the State-level leadership and the block-level Congressmen for their vested interests. "While the government is targeting the coming parliamentary elections to reap the benefits of the scheme, the block Congress members are busy minting money from the rural people through different ways in the name of giving employment,' said Mahanta. This comment has come at a time when State government is celebrating its success achieved in past two years of its rule. NREGA, launched in 2005, included seven districts of Assam in the first phase and six other districts in the next phase. In the third and final stage, starting from April 1, 2008, the Act is to cover all districts of the country except those of Jammu and Kashmir. "Though the government did everything to advertise the Central government scheme in its favour, its district programme coordinators (DPC) at most of districts have not started the process yet,' he said, alleging that the government officials are demanding that applications should be on a printed form only, which is to be issued by the administration. "Nowhere in the Act there is mention of such printed forms, on the contrary, the Act allows common people to apply even on a plain paper,' he said. In many printed forms