The Centre's explicit denial of the caste-based census in the country

New Delhi, Dt

The central government has categorically rejected the caste-based census in the country in the Supreme Court. The central government told the apex court that the caste-based census of backward classes was a very difficult task administratively and removing such information from the scope of the census was a "prudent policy decision". In Bihar, a ten-party delegation led by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and demanded a caste-based census. This decision of the Center has heated up politics in Bihar.

According to an affidavit filed in the Supreme Court, the government had said that there were many errors and inaccuracies in the social, economic and caste-based census conducted in 2011. The Center had filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court in response to a petition filed by Maharashtra. The Maharashtra government had filed an application with the Center and other concerned authorities seeking release of SECC 2011 figures relating to Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and said that despite repeated requests, they were not provided with the information.

The affidavit filed by the secretary of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment said that the central government had issued a notification in January last year determining the details of the data to be collected for the 2021 census, which included various areas including information on Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. No other category of race was mentioned.

The government said the SECC 2011 survey was not an 'OBC survey'. In fact it was a comprehensive process to obtain information on sexual status in all households in the country. The case was heard by Justice A on Thursday. like this. The matter came up for hearing before a bench headed by Khanwilkar, which will next hear the case on October 9.

Meanwhile, politics in Bihar has been heated by the central government's clear denial of the caste-based census. Leader of Opposition in Bihar Tejaswi Yadav said the Bihar Legislative Assembly had passed two resolutions on caste-based census. We also had a meeting with PM Modi on this issue led by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Following the Centre's response in the Supreme Court, we will now discuss this at the grand coalition meeting and work out the next strategy.

Objecting to the Centre's stance, RJD president Lalu Yadav said, "I do not understand why the BJP and the RSS hate the backward and the very backward." Such people should be socially excluded. Caste-based census will benefit all classes. Lalu tweeted that all the animals, birds, plants, trees, including snakes, scorpions, parrots, elephants, horses, dogs and cats in the country would be counted, but the mamas of the most backward classes would not be counted. This kind of attitude of the center is surprising.