New Delhi: In a major development, the Central government has decided to include a caste survey in the next census.
“Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs (CCPA) has decided today that Caste enumeration should be included in the forthcoming census,” Union minister Ashwini Vaishnaw.
The census, likely to be held next year, will include questions on caste to determine various castes and sub-castes, and the number of people in each of those across the country.
The decision to have a national caste survey, which has been a topic of debate and a demand by the Opposition over a number of years, comes months before the Bihar Assembly polls.
Bihar, it may be recalled, was the country’s first state to conduct a caste survey in October 2023 under chief minister Nitish Kumar. However, his party JD(U) was at that time in alliance with the Rashtriya Janata Dal and Congress.
While announcing the big Cabinet decision, Union Railways minister Vaishnaw accused INDIA bloc parties of using the caste-based population count only to gain political mileage.
“It is well understood that the Congress and its INDI alliance partners have used the caste census only as a political tool. 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,” Vaishnaw said.
The Union minister slammed the Congress, saying it always opposed the caste census.
“Congress governments have always opposed the caste census. In 2010, the late Dr Manmohan Singh said 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 decided to conduct a survey of caste or a caste census,” Vaishnaw said.
Vaishnaw claimed 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.
The Congress-helmed Karnataka government recently went ahead with a caste survey, but faced objections from the state’s Vokkaliga and Lingayat communities, which felt that the ‘Social and Educational Survey Report,’ after being commissioned ten years ago, does not adequately represent their interests and needs a thorough review.
Other key Cabinet decisions
The CCPA approved the development of a 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 the go-ahead 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.
