A total of 2,016 ghost workers were paid Rs 20.59 lakh in Assam in 2011-12 under the UPA's flagship programme Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), a report by the Comptroller & Auditor General of India (CAG) revealed.

In its audit report, the CAG exposed `gross inefficiencies' in the implementation of the rural employment generation scheme, including ghost workers, delays in issue of job cards, delayed payment of wages, non-payment of wages, and release of unnecessary grants.

The national auditor noted that data uploaded in the MIS was not reliable because the names & unique ID numbers of holders of job cards appearing in the muster roll bills didn't tally either with the names or ID numbers that were uploaded in the MIS.

Exposing irregularities in issuing of job cards, the report said, "There were irregularities in the issuing of job cards. The cards were issued to unidentified persons, PRI members and gram rozgar sahayaks."

In 2011-12, according to the report, Assam had the second highest number of ghost workers rolled under the rural employment guarantee scheme. With a total of 3,077 ghost workers, Karnataka led the list of eight states where the national auditor detected such workers.

The CAG also accused the governments of states, where irregularities were found, of not designating required state quality monitors for inspection of work.