JOHN HENRY HUTTON, an anthropologist-turned civil services officer, carried out the last caste-based census in India, during British rule in 1931. He did, however, face opposition—such enumeration would only perpetuate the system, said critics. “It is just as easy to argue, and with at least as much truth, that it is impossible to get rid of any institution by ignoring its existence like the proverbial ostrich.... Indeed the treatment of caste at the 1931 census may claim to make a definite, if minute, contribution to Indian unity,” Hutton wrote in the census report.
Almost a century later, Hutton’s concerns are relevant again. After several failed attempts, there is again a push to conduct a caste census. But, instead of a pan-India exercise, some state governments are saying that it can be done at the local level. Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, for instance, has said that Bihar would conduct the census in the next nine months—this is to better understand the socio-economic status of various castes and to pass on the benefits of affirmative action to the marginalised.
The Karnataka government had conducted such a census in 2015, but never made the report public. Bihar, though, is likely to publish the report and set a model for the country.
Though the growing demand to conduct the census has come mainly from caste-based parties such as the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Samajwadi Party and the Janata Dal (United), others like the Telangana Rashtra Samithi, the YSR Congress, the Biju Janata Dal, the Nationalist Congress Party and the Congress are also on board. In fact, last November, the YSR Congress-led Andhra Pradesh government passed a resolution to conduct the census.
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