Why is the government delaying Census 2021?

It is crucial for budget allocations, delimitation of constituencies, and administrative planning.

India’s population figure put up by the International Institute for Population Sciences at Govandi in Mumbai in 2018.Photo: Vivek Bendre | Photo Credit: VIVEK BENDRE

From the first synchronous census in 1881, the decadal census exercise has never been delayed or postponed. Until now. Census 2021 has now been postponed more than once. Initially, it was because of the pandemic, but at least three countries that also saw severe COVID outbreaks—the UK, China, and the US—have since completed their census exercises. The Narendra Modi government, however, has been dragging its feet.

On January 6, the Office of the Registrar General of India (ORGI) announced that the date of freezing the administrative boundaries had been extended from December 31, 2022, to July 1, 2023. This meant that the exercise would begin only after that, spilling well into 2024. With as many as nine States going to the polls, it is not certain whether the exercise will take off even this year.

The delay could be tactical. It is possible that the government wants to wriggle out of enumerating the population sizes of Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and wants to hold back until the general elections are over.

Second, the findings might not confirm the hysteria about growth rates of certain religious groups, which has become a standard campaigning trope for leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party in every election.

Third, the data on fertility rates of religious groups might also present certain inconvenient truths. Four, the claims of achievements in human development and access to amenities might also be belied by census data. Whatever the reason, the government has offered no credible explanation for delaying Census 2021.

The excuse of COVID

On March 28, 2019, Nityanand Rai, Minister of State, Home Affairs, said that the Home Ministry had notified its intent to conduct the census, but owing to COVID-19, field activities were postponed until further orders.

In July 2022, again in response to a question, Rai told Parliament that population projections for the country, States, and Union Territories from 2011 to 2036, based on Census 2011 data, were available in the Report of the Technical Group on Population Projections.

Baffling delay

The delay is baffling. The government has been declaring its intent to conduct the census without actually setting in motion the process of enumeration.

In April 2019, ORGI announced that for the first time in the 140-year-old history of the census, data would be collected using “not only paper and pen” but also mobile devices. On June 25, 2019, a gazette notification announced that a pre-test of the Census of India 2021 would be conducted from August 12 to September 30, 2019.

Before the onset of the pandemic, another gazette notification issued on March 7, 2020, by the Home Ministry under the Census Act, 1948, enumerated a list of 30 questions to be included in the census, concerning building particulars, household particulars, head of the household particulars, normal household items, and assets of the household. The questionnaire would elicit details of whether households had access to a laptop, a computer, the Internet, or a mobile phone.

The pandemic struck within weeks of this, lockdown happened, and the rest is history. When the second wave struck, no one expected census operations to begin. But Assembly elections did take place in November 2020 in Bihar, and four States and one Union Territory went to the polls in 2021. In 2022, Assembly elections were held in two more States. But no one was talking about Census 2021.

In March 2022, another gazette notification amended portions of the Census Act, inserting provisions for self-enumeration, allowing individuals to fill up and submit the census schedule either in a prescribed form or electronically. Statisticians Frontline spoke to said this was unusual. Self-enumeration requires individuals to have a lot of prior information about the questions being asked, a task for which only census operatives are trained. R.B. Bhagat, former Professor and Head, Department of Migration and Urban Studies, International Institute for Population Sciences, said he was sceptical about the idea and that it would be better if enumeration was done by trained enumerators.

Surveys no substitute

Bhagat also said that there were academic implications to a timely census exercise.

The census is a unique exercise in the sense that it gives a complete enumeration with no sampling errors. The government does have mechanisms to collect data through surveys like the National Sample Surveys, Periodic Labour Force Surveys, or Health Management Information Systems surveys through which schemes like the public distribution system (PDS) or the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) are implemented. But the census, Bhagat said, gives a complete picture of the population, and of various categories of the population. Sample surveys and the census complement each other, but sample surveys pretty much rely on census data.

Even though the census is conducted only once in 10 years, it provides the possibility for interpolations, extrapolations, and projections, Bhagat said. This was how data were produced for a wider knowledge base. These data were used for making budget allocations, resource allocation, political delimitation of constituencies, political representation and planning. The value of the census is enormous, Bhagat said.

The Census of India is in two parts: housing and population. A lot of data on housing came up in Census 2001 and Census 2011, said Bhagat, such as housing among SC and ST households, or the number of households headed by women.

Population enumeration is where age, sex, occupational characteristics, and migration data are collected from the head of the household. Sample surveys and projects cannot replace the census, according to Bhagat. The census gives a macro picture, and aggregate data from this gives the larger picture of characteristics.

Sample survey organisations such as the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) help in the estimation of numbers, but they are validated by the census. This is what demographers and population scientists call triangulation of data. Sample surveys are samples at best, unlike the census which “counts” every person.

In the early 1990s, the country woke up to the reality of its adverse sex ratios only through census data. This led to the enactment of legislation criminalising sex selection tests and sex selective abortions. It contributed to policy formulations, including schemes such as Beti Bachao and Beti Padhao. Census data is equally crucial for democratic and political representation. Delimitation, for example, is one way to ensure equal opportunity of representation.

Most demographers believe that the National Population Register (NPR) should not be part of the census schedule. The NPR comes under the Citizenship Act, 2003. If the NPR is linked to the census, it will affect the reporting and quality of data. There is an apprehension that people might not feel free to share information and that would taint census data itself. The census protects data and privacy, unlike the controversial NPR and the accompanying National Register of Citizens.

P.C. Mohanan, Chairman, Kerala State Statistical Commission and former member of the National Statistical Commission, said that the delay in conducting the census was a serious matter. He pointed out that the census advisory committee had not met for the last one and a half years. Administrators were still using 2011 numbers, he pointed out, relying on projections to estimate present requirements. The delay, said Mohanan, is destroying the country’s statistical edifice.

The pandemic was unprecedented. But it also became a handy excuse to not do many things. It was a “convergence of convenience”, as a demographer put it. What was unleashed then was an “expanded digital and a shrinking physical” mindset where robust data collection was not exactly a priority.

Whether economic, caste, or unemployment figures, the government has made its discomfort with data clear. But delaying the census any further could destroy the solid numbers-based structure of the administration itself.

The Crux

• From the first census in 1881, the decadal census exercise has never been delayed or postponed. Until now. Census 2021 has now been postponed more than once.
• The exercise would now begin only after July 1, 2023.
• The government has been declaring its intent to conduct the census without actually setting in motion the process of enumeration.