National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (2005), later renamed as Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) is one of the most significant interventions of the Government in post-Independent India. Aiming at addressing the principal causes of hunger and starvation in rural areas, the Act ensures to the poor that they can expect to earn a living wage, without loss of their dignity, and demand work as their right. In addition to the immediate impact in terms of poverty reduction, the program has the potential to lead the economy in labor intensive growth path through the creation of assets. However, the positive achievements of the intervention have been lost in the noise of critical reports and anti-MGNREGA propaganda. The productive value of MGNREGA work has been criticized as a futile attempt “to play with mud, to create road that goes from nowhere to nowhere, to dig ditches that will be wasted away in the next monsoon”. The objective of the present study is to take a more informed look at the MGNREGA to assess the effectiveness of the assets created in three districts of Madhya Pradesh.