Taking a leaf out of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), the Kerala government will soon roll out an employment guarantee scheme for overseas returnees with assured employment days in key selected industries where they have expertise. The first-of-its-kind scheme in the country for the returnees, the scheme titled NoRKA (Non-Resident Keralites Affairs) Assisted and Mobilised Employment (NAME) is a programme exclusively meant for overseas returnees.
Corpus fund of ₹5 crore
Speaking to The Hindu, NoRKA-Roots Chief Executive Officer K. Harikrishnan Namboothiri said the State government had set aside a corpus fund of ₹5 crore to pilot the project this financial year. The scheme envisages providing guaranteed employment for the returnees in sectors where their expertise can be utilised. The State government would provide a certain percentage of the wages of the employee for a certain period to the employer as part of the scheme.
