Why a Caste Census Matters

For the first time since 1932, caste will be formally enumerated in the next national Census. The move is widely seen as a political counter to Congress and other Opposi­tion parties, who have sought to use caste as a key issue to challenge the ruling BJP.

Information and Broadcasting Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw announced the government’s decision after a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Politi­cal Affairs on April 30. This marks a big departure from past practice, where caste beyond Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes has been ex­cluded from official Census data since India’s freedom.

The Modi government claims that including caste in the Census could of­fer a clearer picture of the country’s social composition. However, the decision also comes in response to growing demands from Opposition parties who have pushed for a caste census to address what they argue is an imbalance in access to government sup­port and representation.

Vaishnaw was categorical in his criticism of Congress, recalling that the UPA government in 2011 failed to carry out a full caste census and instead commissioned a Socio-Economic and Caste Census (SECC). That exercise, in his view, was riddled with classification errors with sub-castes and sects often listed as separate castes and the data was never released by either the Manmohan Singh government or the NDA that followed.

Several Opposition parties continue to argue that a caste census is essential to ensure fairness in the distribution of state benefits. Congress, for its part, had gone further, promising to remove the 50 per cent cap on reservations if it were voted to power, and proposing that reservations be extended to the private sector. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi pledged that a Congress-led government would conduct an “X-ray” of Indian society through such an exercise.

Meanwhile, BJP has main­tained that while it is not op­posed to caste enumeration, the process must be handled with care and carried out through the formal Census, rather than sloppy state-level surveys. Vaishnaw pointed out that although states such as Bihar and Karnataka have already conducted such surveys, their results have not been satisfactory.

Citing Article 246 of the Constitution, Vaishnaw clarified that the Census is a Union subject, giving the Centre the sole authority to undertake such an exercise.

The caste question indeed has deep roots in our political history. In 1921, the Justice Party-led government in Madras introduced a Com­munal Government Order prescribing quotas for various communities to reduce Brahmin dominance in educa­tion and government jobs. After Independence, the issue of caste-based reservations remained contentious. In 1950, when the Madras order was challenged in court, the judiciary ruled it unconstitu­tional. In response, the Jawaharlal Nehru govern­ment amended the Constitu­tion to enable reservations.

However, Nehru later ex­pressed misgivings about the impact of reservations. In a 1961 letter to chief ministers, he warned that over-reliance on quotas could undermine efficiency and promote medi­ocrity. Still, over the following decades, successive govern­ments deepened the reserva­tion framework, especially after the Mandal Commis­sion’s recommendations were implemented under Prime Minister VP Singh.

Congress, in fact, has had a complex relationship with caste-based reservations. The late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, for instance, had opposed the imple­mentation of the Mandal Commission’s proposals in Parliament, arguing that they risked fragmenting society.

Now, the Centre’s decision to conduct caste enumeration is interpreted as a bid to under­cut the Opposition’s potential identity-based mobilisation. While the exercise could, in theory, provide a clearer picture of our intricate caste

demographics, it without doubt, comes with political risks. And it remains to be seen whether BJP’s new measure will succeed in neu­tralising the Opposition’s narrative ahead of the next General Election.

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