The Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Act, 2025: Legislative Design, Constitutional Architecture and the Evolving Framework of Rural Livelihood Guarantees

Abstract

The Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission Gramin Act, 2025, constitutes a decisive reorganization of the statutory framework governing rural employment and livelihood security in India. Against the backdrop of changing development paradigms and falling demand under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005; the 2025 Act endeavors to reconstitute rural employment as a mission integrating employment, skill generation and sustainable rural livelihoods. This research paper undertakes a comprehensive legal and policy analysis of the VB-G RAM G Act through five interrelated frames: legislative history and policy rationale; constitutional foundations within the Directive Principles of State Policy and Fundamental Rights jurisprudence; comparative perspectives from domestic and international employment-guarantee regimes; implementation challenges and economic implications; and the scope of judicial review in enforcing socio-economic guarantees. The paper contends that the new law represents a paradigmatic shift in terms of outcome-oriented rural development and fiscal rationalisation. It simultaneously evokes critical constitutional and justiciability challenges. Specifically, the re-calibration of the mechanisms of enforceability, the decentralised mechanisms of planning and the conditionality of entitlements warrant a re-examination under the guarantees of Articles 14, 21 and 23 of the Constitution of India. A comparative analysis of the VB-G RAM G Act with the MGNREGA and other global similar schemes such as the Jefes y Jefas system in Argentina and the Expanded Public Works Programme in South Africa will plot the relative framework of the argument to substantiate the role such legislation assumes in terms of the efficacy of the legal standing of the right to work. Adopting doctrinal method of research, it concludes that the long-term efficacy of the VB-G RAM G Act is dependent upon the judiciary’s willingness to enforce the constitutional guarantee to dignified livelihoods as a fundamental component of substantive equality.