New Delhi, May 5 (Inditop.com) The Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) Wednesday said it was in favour of including caste as a criterion in the ongoing national census and added that the enumeration exercise should be used to ascertain the number of people living below poverty line.
Party leader S.S. Ahluwalia said data collected during the 1931 census on caste were used to provide reservation benefits. He said the country’s population had grown manifold since independence.
“The caste criterion in the census can be considered by the government,” he said.
Several leaders from backward classes have demanded enumerating the population on the basis of caste, saying that it is a reality in Indian society and having caste-based data would help plan various socio-economic schemes. The issue was discussed at a meeting of the union cabinet Tuesday.
Ahluwalia told reporters that the census could also help ascertain the number of people living below the poverty line. Quoting various reports, he said the figure varied “from 37 percent to 79 percent”.
“A single exercise (census) can be used to collect all the data,” he said.
The party also demanded that government drop the nationality column in the national population register (NPR) as there was a strong possibility of it being misused by illegal migrants in the country.
Ahluwalia said that the NPR had a column “nationality as declared” which can be misused by secessionist forces and illegal migrants. He demanded that the government stop collecting information under the column.
“If it is stopped, it will be better,” Ahluwalia said after a meeting of the BJP parliamentary party Wednesday morning where issues related to the census were discussed.
The NPR involves creation of a digital database having identity details of all individuals along with their photographs and finger biometrics. Data collection for NPR is being done along with house listing and housing census.
