Hours after the Union government on Wednesday (April 30) announced that a caste census will be conducted along with the decadal census without providing any timeline for its rollout, leader of opposition in the Lok Sabha and Congress MP Rahul Gandhi said that the party welcomes the move as it has been a long-standing demand.
While the Modi government’s move is being seen in the light of the upcoming Bihar elections, Gandhi said that “it does not matter why” the decision has been taken and demanded a timeline from the government.
Opposition members while demanding a timeline also called it a victory of the INDIA alliance, which had made a nationwide caste census a core poll plank of its 2024 Lok Sabha election campaign – a move that had then been criticised by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) as a bid to divide society.
“I don’t think the Bihar election had played any role behind the decision,” Gandhi said while addressing a press conference in New Delhi.
“It does not matter why they took the decision. We have been fighting for very long [on the caste census]. We are happy. We welcome it. We want to ask the government by when the process will be completed. We want dates.”
Earlier on Wednesday, in a sharp reversal from his party’s stance in the Lok Sabha election campaign, Union minister for information and broadcasting Ashwini Vaishnaw announced that caste enumeration will be done along with the decadal census and accused the Congress and the opposition of using the caste census as a “political tool”.
Union home minister Amit Shah too said that the Congress and its allies “opposed the caste census for decades while in power and played politics over it while in the opposition.”
Gandhi said that while the Congress had been advocating for a nationwide caste census, the Modi government had opposed it but now decided to implement it “suddenly”.
“We’ve been advocating for a caste census for some time. The government had previously opposed it for some reason. We don’t understand what that reason is. They have suddenly decided to bring it, we welcome that,” said Gandhi.
Calling the caste census a “new paradigm of development”, Gandhi said that the Congress wants to go beyond the caste census.
“We’ve discussed two other key issues. Firstly, the 50% cap on reservations, which is increasingly becoming an impediment to development, the progress of our country and the advancement of backward castes, Dalits and Adivasis. We want this barrier to be eliminated. The third [sic] issue is, we demand the implementation of Article 15(5), which is reservations in private educational institutions. We urge the government to implement it promptly,” he said.
“We see the caste census as a new paradigm of development and we want to go beyond the caste census. We want to understand what the participation of 90% of our population is in the power structure of the country, where they are participating effectively and where they are not. We want to give them participation.
“We are convinced that a caste census is the first step in the new development paradigm in the country and we are going to push this paradigm.”
Gandhi added that the ‘Telangana model’ of conducting a caste census can be used as a blueprint for the national census and that the party can help the government in developing such a model.
It was in Bihar under the then-Janata Dal (United)-Rashtriya Janata Dal government in November 2023, when the Nitish Kumar-led JD(U) was a part of the INDIA bloc before his return to the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) ahead of the general elections, that the Bihar caste survey was conducted, which led to a political storm.
While the BJP, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, had opposed it as a move to divide society, the local BJP unit had supported it.
Speaking to reporters after the Union cabinet’s decision was announced, former Bihar deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav said that those who levelled allegations against them for dividing society have received an answer.
“Our longstanding demand which we have been fighting for in the assembly and even in court … today the [Union] government has been forced to bow down before our demand. While it is only an announcement, when it will happen, no one knows. We hope that the caste census will be done before delimitation. Those who used to level allegations against us for dividing society, today they have received an answer,” he said.
The JD(U)-RJD government passed crucial amendments in the state assembly to breach the Supreme Court-mandated 50% ceiling on reservations. The amendments followed the caste survey in Bihar, which showed that 65% of the state’s population belonged to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, other backward classes and extremely backward classes but that these four groups had abysmal representation in government jobs and educational institutions.
In June 2024, the Patna high court set aside the Bihar government’s decision to breach the ceiling on reservations. The case is now being heard in the Supreme Court.
Samajwadi Party chief and Lok Sabha MP Akhilesh Yadav called the Union cabinet’s decision “a 100% victory of the unity of 90% PDA” (pichhda, Dalit, alpsankhyak) due to the combined pressure of the opposition.
“The decision of [a] caste census is a 100% victory of the unity of 90% PDA. Due to the combined pressure of all of us, the BJP government has been forced to take this decision. This is a very important phase of PDA’s victory in the fight for social justice,” he said.
The Samajwadi Party had in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections run its campaign on the back of the demand for a caste census and the PDA strategy, and bested the BJP in Uttar Pradesh by handing the saffron party its worst defeat in a decade.
The Samajwadi-Congress combine won 43 out of the 80 seats in the largest Indian state.
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) in a statement called the cabinet’s move a “belated decision” “to the unanimous demand of [the] opposition”.
“However, even now there is no timeline given. Caste socio-economic survey is essential to ensure social justice in govt policies,” CPI(M) general secretary M.A. Baby said.
All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen MP Asaduddin Owaisi while welcoming the government’s move also lauded Telangana chief minister Revanth Reddy for conducting the caste survey in the state.
“This was the first-ever initiative of its kind in Independent India, revealing 56.32% of the state has a Backward Castes population. Telangana took the extraordinary decision to propose to implement 42% BC reservations also. The need of the hour is proper data on the backwardness of Muslims, including the various castes/groups among Muslims,” he said.
Tamil Nadu chief minister M.K. Stalin of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam called Wednesday’s decision a “hard-earned victory” for his government and his party and said the “sudden” nature of the move “reeks of political expediency” as it comes ahead of the Bihar elections.
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