That exercise is independent of next year's broader national population census, the data collection exercise highlighted in my 6(8) Privacy Law Bulletin (2010) article on that nation's ambitious national ID card scheme and in a recent ANZSOG law seminar paper on 'Technological Identity Gothic'.
Home Minister P Chidambaram indicated that -
A separate house-to-house enumeration of caste will be done during the period June 2011 to September 2011. This satisfies all the various requirements that have been projected and discussed and debated extensively.The caste census is estimated to cost around US$650 to $850 million.
Identification of caste in a national census represents a major policy shift, with caste identity data not having been collected on a comprehensive scale for over 50 years.
The WSJ indicates that the national government has not provided a specific rationale for polling people on their caste, although proponents reportedly claim that the information will facilitate the delivery of income support and other welfare to members of the lower castes (positioning in the hierarchy typically reflecting economic status).
Other sources suggest that participants in the census, which as noted earlier in this blog is mandatory, will be asked "What is your caste?". People will reportedly be free to report "No caste".
The WSJ reports that -
In a statement announcing its decision, the cabinet of the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the caste "of all persons as returned by them would be canvassed" in a special census in mid-2011.The report notes comments by Bhakta Charan Das MP that government recognition of caste through the census comes at a time when India should have -
India's Office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner will first measure people on their caste and tribes and the information then will be classified by an expert group that the Indian government will form at a later date, the government said.
The last time a full caste census was conducted was under British rule in 1931. The government acknowledged it was changing a practice that "had been given up as a matter of policy after independence."
It said it made the move "in response to the demands for enumerating castes." India's regular decennial census started in April and will conclude in March 2011.
The government currently reserves 22.5% of all jobs in its offices and seats in government colleges and universities for Dalits and students from India's indigenous tribes, who also receive special benefits under the constitution. The percentage is based on 1961 census data.
In the early 1990s, the government decided to put aside a further 27% of government jobs for people socially and economically marginalized due to the caste system, known in demographic parlance as "other backward classes."
That policy concession was forced by the political momentum built on the claim that these groups constituted 52% of India's total population based on the 1931 census data. That government move met with number of violent protests around the country mainly by upper-caste youths who saw it as limiting their career prospects.
legally abolished the caste system ... it's time to abolish the caste system and let the Indian nation live in dignity ...Surjit Bhalla in the Indian Business Standard of 22 May commented that -
the caste census will disturb the peace and progress in India's villages where people were slowly coming out of the caste prison and over 70% of India's youth whose liberal minds will now get imprisoned in the petty caste issues.
On the grounds that more information is always good, or at least cannot hurt, the Indian government is about to embark on a new social experiment — caste will be included as a question in the forthcoming 2011 Census. This will be a first in independent India; the last time caste was included as a question, and the only time, was in 1931. At that time, several castes petitioned the government to classify them as a caste higher to one they actually were. Census 2011, if it does include caste, is likely to show a race to the bottom, with at least 20 percent of the Hindu population declaring themselves as Other Backward Castes (OBCs) when they actually belong to an upper caste. The question the social engineers in the political parties have to answer is whether gathering of this false information serves any purpose.
Most of the arguments over the inclusion of caste in the census, whether made by politicians or the so-called liberals and/or so-called intellectuals supporting this crass exercise, centre on the following two propositions. First, the government targets a large segment of the population for redistribution of income. The government has, over the last 60 years and starting with our fundamentally flawed Constitution, allowed for reservations in access to education, jobs, etc. for the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs). Note that our flawed Constitution did not talk about the need for affirmative action to tackle the justifiable cause of redressing inequality; no, the social engineering objective then, as it is today, was to mandate equality via quotas. In the 1990s, an additional quota was added — a quota for the OBCs. Together with the SCs/STs, the quotas corner at least 60 per cent of the population (approximately 27 per cent SCs/STs and 36 per cent OBCs).
