Helping People Help Myself

I'm in Hyderabad, the state capital of Andra Pradesh to see current initiatives for the largest national poverty reduction scheme in India. It is a social welfare program to provide 100 days of work to the rural poor. More importantly, it is the first national program that mandates the social audit, an instrument to provide a channel for the poor to check the government's accountability and to enable the targeted people to claim their entitlements. For example, if the registered people did not get adequate number of days to work or if they didn't receive the accurate payment, they can claim their rights. On the ground, however, it is not simple as such.
Some people may not be aware their entitlements; some may not want to raise issues to avoid being threatened by local rich etc
Through the brief study and a few discussions, I felt that this social audit is still top-down because, principally, social auditors visit villages and report findings to the government. There is a form that registered people can submit their claims; nevertheless, I did not see sufficient empowerment of the villagers to fully utilize the mechanism or a solid system that the government seriously deal with the claim to solve problems.
Positively thinking, there are many opportunities to improve social audit and monitoring mechanism as a whole for, not only the NREGS (National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme) but for government schemes.

It is still the first day in Hyderabad so I would like to dig more.