Should caste be included in Indian census?

For the first time since 1931 India is debating whether to include caste in census, many experts say that it can be used for better governance and will help government in implementing its socio-economic development programmes while other say that’s it will divide India on basis of caste and will harm sovereign concept of nation.

The census is the largest single source of a variety of statistical information on different characteristics of the Indian people. The census operation, held once in 10 years, will cover 1.2 billion people — and more — in one single database.

Supporters of caste enumeration argue that caste is an inescapable reality of Indian society and census categories merely reflect existing classifications, and that only the census can provide the figures necessary to map inequality by caste. For social justice, we are made to believe there is no alternative to reservation, and for reservation, no alternative to counting caste.

This caste-based census is nothing but an identity politics in our elections. The politicians who are interested in the caste census data are not as interested in advancing the living standards, as they are in organising them into vote banks. If they are so interested then what were they doing till now, waiting for this Census.

“Demand for caste based census is only the illogical product of quota based politics.”

This Census will give rise to new problems. It has been asserted by the government that this data will not be subjected to analysis. Caste groups and their status differ from region to region. A certain caste in a particular state having the same name can be an upper caste, a backward caste in another state and the most backward in the third state.

In the last 70 years, some caste names have changed, quite a few new ones have emerged, several castes have merged with others or have moved up or down the social hierarchy, and many have become politically active.

Also, such legitimisation of casteism will strengthen the hands of reactionary and obscurantist like khap panchayats.

There is no doubt that stringent affirmative action policies are required to make formal institutions more socially inclusive, but to shackle the census to this agenda betrays a failure to learn from the past or to think imaginatively about the future.

Caste based census is nothing but a ploy to further the segregation of Indians into a myriad of entities which can be relied upon as vote banks.

In the 21st century as the whole world is concerned more and more of development, there is no need for furthering casteism and caste-based vote banking.

We need to change this caste based ugly reality into a better future. Therefore, there is a need for a different approach to remove this caste-based politics and differentiation. Reservation should be given only to those who are socially and economically backward and not to those who belong to a particular caste.

“Census recording of social precedence is a device of colonial domination, designed to undermine as well as to disprove Indian nationhood.”

Let us end this politics of division, of reservation, of favour and corruption now. Let us acknowledge what shameful legacy of caste we Indians have been given by our forefathers and refuse to reenact it through the census. Let us once and for all face it down and bury it.

Social Inequality Threatening India's Economy

Can a country where a third of the population is illiterate be an Information Technology superpower? Can a country where 78 million rural homes have never seen electricity be an economic superpower?

While India’s educated elite are reveling in their new found status on the global stage, inequitable distribution of wealth and opportunities are shaking the very foundation of India’s new economy.

India has one of the fastest widening of social inequalities, where rich are getting richer and poor are getting poorer. India is becoming rich land with poor people.













Let me share some of the quivering facts

One-Third of world’s poor is in India. You need only to look out onto the streets, to see the enormous increase in conspicuous consumption by the rich and even the urban upper middle income groups, and also to see side by side how the lives of the poor have become even more vulnerable and precarious.

In the last five years (2004 to 2009) the number of people below the poverty line has increased from 270 million to touch 325 million. That is an increase of 55 million people below the poverty line in five years.

In the last 12 years, India’s economy has grown at an average annual rate of about 7 percent, reducing poverty by 10 percent however about 42 percent of our population lives below the international poverty line of $1.25 per day, most of them without even basic of amenities.

More than one third live on less than a dollar a day, and 80 percent live on less than two dollars a day. Though many of our countrymen were featured in the list of the richest people of the world, we still have more than seventeen million children working as bonded laborers.
India has the higher rates of malnourished children than sub-Saharan Africa, with about 46 percent of Indian children under the age of 3 years suffering from malnutrition.

Undoubtedly, these statistics are not in India’s favor.

The distribution of the benefits of economic expansion tends to be severely unequal. This is for a variety of reasons, in which, of course, the unequal ownership of capital is an important factor. We thus have an odd situation, in which the process of economic development is going ahead at a reasonably fast pace, but where a very large section of the community - indeed, the majority of the community - is not in a position to join in it. A decent society cannot be built on the ruins of hunger, malnutrition, ill health and illiteracy.

The biggest failure in India is social inequality; it takes its toll both directly - in terms of the quality of life - and indirectly - in terms of reducing the economic opportunities that people have.
Let’s come together from all the walks of life and help change such statistics by our noble deeds. Let’s reach out to the underprivileged.

Let’s join hands and raise our voices against malpractice, incompetence, corruption and apathy of most of the administrative systems of our society.

Let’s think beyond the obvious to lend a hand to the poor and needy at the time they need a friend like us.

Lets treat the impoverished with empathy and not sympathy. We all are citizens of India and have equal fundamental duties and rights. Let’s believe and make others believe in the social equality.

And let’s begin by helping our country change those poor statistics