Congress National President Mallikarjun Kharge and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi have written a joint letter to Prime Minister Modi expressing serious concern over the current process of caste census. Along with this, there has been a demand to cancel the existing questionnaire and make a new questionnaire based on the certified list of castes.
Mallikarjun Kharge said in a post on social media platform
Our demand is clear that the existing questionnaire should be cancelled, a new questionnaire should be made on the basis of the certified list of castes and extensive consultation should be held with political parties, experts and the public. The practical solution is to enumerate on the basis of already prepared and certified caste lists, like the caste surveys of Telangana and Bihar. Caste census should not only be done, it should also be correct.”
In a letter addressed to the Prime Minister, Rahul Gandhi and Kharge wrote, “Social justice policies in India cannot be completed without accurate data. Correct assessment of the number of different castes and their socio-economic status is possible only when the castes are counted correctly. Your government has chosen the method of open-ended questions to record caste information in the census, which is misleading. In this, the name of the caste given by each person will be recorded only.”
Congress leaders wrote in the letter, “In India, the same caste is known by different names, sub-castes and languages in different areas. In such a situation, if people of the same caste are registered with different names in the census, then one caste will be divided into thousands of names. The names of lakhs of castes will be known in the country and the entire data obtained from the caste census will become useless.
When the correct number of a community is not recorded, the assessment of its situation will also be wrong. It will harm backward, extremely backward and other deprived communities. Besides, decisions related to education, employment, schemes and social justice will also be affected. This will also not reveal what is the OBC population in India because the word “backward class” is not even included in this census.”
He wrote, “An easy solution already exists. A drop-down list of castes should be created. The same method is adopted in enumerating Scheduled Castes and Tribes.
This list can be easily prepared on the basis of existing government lists like Social and Educational Backward Class List and Anthropological Survey of India. The same method was adopted in the caste surveys of Telangana and Bihar. The caste lists of both the surveys are attached with the letter for reference. We do not accept the caste census being conducted in this manner.
“The government should cancel the existing questionnaire and prepare a new questionnaire after talking to political parties, experts and the public so that the correct number of every caste and community is revealed and the caste census is accurate, meaningful and beneficial.”
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