New Delhi: Union Rural Development Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Friday launched an upgraded version of the National Mobile Monitoring System (NMMS) app to prevent fake attendance under the VB-G RAM G scheme.
The new version of the application will have enhanced security features and provisions for recording attendance offline in areas without network connectivity.
"The government's priority was to ensure employment for rural workers, protect their wages and ensure that public funds were used transparently and for their intended purpose," Chouhan said at a press conference here.
"Technology must strengthen accountability without allowing genuine workers to be denied their entitlements because of connectivity or technical problems," Chouhan said.
The upgraded app, developed with technical support from IIT Madras and other agencies, incorporates device-level security checks, AI-based face verification, liveness detection and safeguards against cloning and tampering.
Chouhan said complaints of fake attendance and wages being claimed in the names of other individuals had necessitated stronger verification measures.
Face authentication was introduced in March 2026, while the latest version builds on a security update released in the last week of September.
Attendance can be recorded offline at worksites without network access and uploaded once connectivity is restored, after the muster roll is closed. An exception mechanism is also available for elderly workers, persons with disabilities and those facing technical difficulties with mobile devices.
The minister said recording attendance through the app did not automatically determine wage payments. An AI-based photo de-duplication system flags suspicious or repeated photographs, with wage lists and Fund Transfer Orders withheld until the entries are verified.
Wages are calculated on the basis of work recorded in electronic measurement books following physical measurement by technical engineers, and payments are transferred directly to workers' bank accounts through the Direct Benefit Transfer system.
"Employment would be provided to those who need it, but corruption and irregularities would not be tolerated," Chouhan said.
Nearly 46 crore person-days have been generated under the scheme since its implementation across rural areas from July 1. Employment has been provided to more than 3.65 crore workers belonging to 2.89 crore rural households, with work undertaken at 31.23 lakh sites across more than 2.41 lakh gram panchayats.
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Around 40 crore person-days were recorded through face authentication, he said. Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand have achieved 100 per cent attendance recording through the system.
The Centre has allocated Rs 95,692 crore for the scheme in 2026-27. Including the states' share, the total provision exceeds Rs 1.51 lakh crore.
Chouhan also said 10.997 crore Farmer IDs had been generated nationwide, bringing the country within 30,000 of the 11-crore target set for December 2027.
Rural Development Secretary Rohit Kansal, Joint Secretary Rohini R Bhajibhakre and other officials were present at the launch.
