New Delhi: Caste census will be included in the next national census exercise in a “transparent manner”, Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw announced on Wednesday, saying a decision to this effect was taken at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
“Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs has decided to include caste enumeration in forthcoming census exercise,” the Union Minister said in a media briefing on Wednesday, adding that it will ensure that the society is economically and socially empowered, and the nation progress as well.
The census exercise was to commence in April 2020 but got delayed due to the Covid pandemic. Had the exercise been carried out as per the 10-year schedule, the report would have been published in 2021.
While announcing the big Cabinet decision, Vaishnaw trained guns on the Congress, saying the party always opposed the caste census. He also attacked other INDIA bloc parties, accusing them of using the caste-based population count only to gain political mileage.
“Congress governments have always opposed the caste census. In 2010, the late Dr Manmohan Singh said in the Parliament that the matter of caste census should be considered in the Cabinet. A group of ministers was formed to consider this subject. Most of the political parties have recommended a caste census. Despite this, the Congress government thought it appropriate to conduct a survey known as SECC,” Vaishnaw said.
“It is well understood that the Congress and its INDI alliance partners have used the caste census only as a political tool. The subject of census is mentioned at serial number 69 of the Union List of Article 246 of the Constitution and it is a subject of the Center. Some states have conducted surveys to enumerate castes. While some states have done this well, some others conducted such surveys only from a political angle in a non-transparent way,” he added.
The Railways Minister went on to say that such surveys “created doubts” in society and added that to ensure that the social fabric is not disturbed by politics, caste enumeration should be included in the census instead of surveys. It has been a long-standing demand of the Congress, INDIA bloc and some of the regional parties that the Centre announce a caste census. Recently, Congress-ruled Karnataka went ahead with a caste survey of its own.
However, it faced objections from the Vokkaliga and Lingayat communities of Karnataka. These communities argue that the ‘Social and Educational Survey Report,’ after being commissioned ten years ago, does not adequately represent their interests and needs a thorough review.
Bihar Chief Minister and BJP ally in the state, Nitish Kumar, welcomed the Centre’s move on a caste census. “The decision of the Central Government to conduct a caste census is welcome. Our demand for conducting a caste census is old. It is a matter of great happiness that the Central Government has decided to conduct a caste census. Conducting a caste census will reveal the number of people of different classes, which will help in making plans for their upliftment and development. This will accelerate the development of the country. Congratulations and thanks to the Honourable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi ji for the decision to conduct caste census,” Kumar said in post on X. Notably, Bihar was the first state to table a caste census report in October 2023, according to which 36 per cent of the state’s total population belonged to the Extremely Backward class. Around 27.13 per cent of Bihar’s 13 crore population fell in the Backward Class category.
The exercise was carried out in two phases, with the first one focusing on household counting and the latter on gathering data related to people’s caste and socio-economic conditions. The Bihar unit of the BJP started celebrating Centre’s announcement of a caste census.
.Meanwhile, in a further push to his caste census demand earlier this month, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, pledged that the party would lift the 50 per cent cap on reservations for Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST), and Other Backward Classes (OBC) in education and government jobs. Among other decisions taken at the CCPA meet on Wednesday, the government approved the development of greenfield high-speed corridor of 166.80 km (NH-6) from Mawlyngkhung (near Shillong) in Meghalaya to Panchgram (near Silchar) in Assam on Hybrid Annuity Mode (HAM) at a total cost of Rs.22,864 crore. The Cabinet Committee also gave its nod to the Fair and Remunerative Price (FRP) of sugarcane for sugar season 2025-26 at to be Rs 355/quintal for the basic recovery rate of 10.25 per cent, providing a premium of Rs.3.46/quintal for each 0.1 per cent increase in recovery over 10.25 per cent, and reduction in FRP by Rs.3.46/quintal for every 0.1 per cent decrease in recovery.
