Pitfalls of the Karnataka caste count

India Today

27-04-2025

(NOTE: This article was originally published in the India Today issue dated May 5, 2025)A long-gestating item on Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah's policy wishlist finally made it to the agenda of a cabinet meeting on April 17. The consternation among the Congress's own legislators, the aggravated tones in community debates in the state, perhaps beyond, all that had been building up. For, on the table was the 306-page report of the Karnataka Social and Educational Survey (KSES) 2015—the first caste census of recent times, predating that of Bihar and methodologically more comprehensive, to see the light of day. The report gives a detailed break-up of the caste composition of Karnataka's population and, based on a weighted assessment of socio-economic, educational and employment parameters, recommends a hike in reservation quota for the Backward Classes, a demographic segment now confirmed as accounting for about 70 per cent.advertisementThe survey was commissioned in 2014, a year into Siddaramaiah's first term in office, and remains the first such door-to-door survey conducted by Karnataka since 1984. (The Union government's own 2011 Socio-Economic and Caste Census famously stayed under wraps.) Prior to that, the only caste-based demographic data had come from the 1931 all-India census, which had included a caste count. A decade behind the veil, the KSES 2015 report has always been a political minefield. Once made public, resistance to its results came from various quarters, most vocally from Karnataka's two biggest caste groups—the Veerashaiva-Lingayats and Vokkaligas—who cast doubt on the accuracy of the exercise that covered 59.8 million people, or 94 per cent of Karnataka's estimated 63.5 million citizens. A purported 'leak' in 2016 of the numerical strength of major communities had aggravated their fears of an undercount, causing a furore. The actual survey data, however, did not make it to the open then—in fact, its report was never submitted to the government. It was not until 2023, when Siddaramaiah returned to power, that an order was issued tasking K. Jayaprakash Hegde, the then chairman of the Karnataka State Backward Classes Commission, to prepare a full report utilising data from the 2015 survey.advertisement
Hegde handed over his new report in February 2024 but it remained in its sealed boxes—till it was sprung on everyone at a cabinet meeting on April 11. The April 17 meeting was set to formally discuss its implementation but, amidst much gnashing of teeth, it remained inconclusive and a new date, May 2, has been set for the discussion. There are two theories about the problematic passage the report is facing even within the Congress government. One contains motives worthy of a political thriller.
This more dramatic script focuses on the fact that the report's unveiling coincides with Siddaramaiah completing two years of his second tenure. From the start, it's been a stint defined by his rivalry with deputy D.K. Shivakumar, who has been biding time for a shot at the top job. Talk of a mid-term change-of-guard has been one of the enduring intrigues in Karnataka, giving rival parties ample chance to target it. 'The CM uses the caste census as a distraction whenever his chair is under threat,' said the BJP's R. Ashoka, Leader of the Opposition in the assembly, in a post on X.advertisementThat April 16 post also reeled off a volley of 12 posers on the report, which Ashoka termed 'unscientific'. He also pointed out that Shivakumar, a Vokkaliga, was a signatory to a 2023 demand by a caste body, the Rajya Vokkaligara Sangha (RVS), to reject the report. Like other Vokkaliga leaders, he implied, Shivakumar will be answerable to the community. That he went into a huddle with party MLAs ahead of the April 17 meeting, and that it stayed inconclusive, did not disprove that line.
(Graphics by Tanmoy Chakraborty)
THE WELFARIST LOGICThe other theory is more anodyne. The caste census has been a key plank of the Congress in recent times—Rahul Gandhi, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, is now one of its chief votaries. Building up momentum around the theme, Bihar had released its own caste survey in October 2023. Congress-ruled Telangana came out with its own census in February 2024. In fact, during the recent All India Congress Committee meeting at Ahmedabad, Telangana chief minister A. Revanth Reddy came in for praise for the accomplishment. The caste census was also a key promise in the Congress manifesto for the 2023 Karnataka assembly election. By this token, Siddaramaiah had procrastinated for a year, and had little choice but to table the long-pending report now.advertisementKarnataka has a long history of seeking to assess community-specific markers of socio-economic progress and working those into affirmative action. The princely state of Mysore was among the pioneers of backward class reservation. A committee set up by Maharaja Krishnaraja Wadiyar IV recommended in 1921 that all communities other than Brahmins should be regarded as backward. In the past 50 years, there have been three committee reports that guided the state's backward quotas: the Havanur report of 1975, the T. Venkataswamy report of 1986 (which was rejected), and the Justice O. Chinnappa Reddy report of 1990. However, in 1994, the Karnataka government formulated a reservation policy that exceeded the 50 per cent cap set by the Supreme Court, and therefore had to be revised following a legal challenge. Thus evolved a categorisation of backward classes into five groups that is still being followed. The categories—I, IIa, IIb, IIIa and IIIb—account for 32 per cent reservation. Since quota for Scheduled Castes and Tribes was enhanced to 24 per cent in 2022 under a BJP regime, the total reservation in Karnataka stands at 56 per cent now. Barring the SC/STs, Brahmins and a handful of other small castes, all others, including backward Muslim and Christian sub-groups, are part of the Backward Classes, who form approximately 70 per cent of the total.advertisementThe KSES Report 2024 backs this up with data collected via a 54-point questionnaire during the 2015 enumeration. According to it, the SCs and STs formed 18.3 per cent and 7.2 per cent of the state's population, respectively. Of the other segments, the biggest were Muslims, with a population of 7.6 million (12.9 per cent); Veerashaiva-Lingayat at 6.6 million (11.1 per cent); Vokkaliga at 6.1 million (10.3 per cent); and the backward Kuruba at 4.4 million (7.3 per cent). The report recommends increasing the state's backwards quota from the existing 32 per cent to 51 per cent. It also advises dividing an existing OBC quota category into two, moving some castes from one to the other.advertisementVeteran Congress MLA Shamanur Shivashankarappa, also the president of the All India Veerashaiva Mahasabha, has warned of a backlash if the report is implemented, saying the Lingayats and Vokkaligas will fight together. Arguing that the data is flawed, the Mahasabha points out that the Veerashaiva-Lingayats had been estimated at 6 million, then 17 per cent of the population, by the Chinnappa Reddy Commission in 1990. Claiming an undercount, saying the 2015 enumeration left out as many as 16 sub-castes within the community, it has called for a fresh survey.The RVS has taken a similar stand, and calls on Vokkaliga legislators to resign if the report is implemented. It's not just the Vokkaliga numbers—the figures for Lingayat and other communities, too, 'have left me shocked,' said Union minister H.D. Kumaraswamy, a Vokkaliga and state president of the Janata Dal (Secular), in a post on X on April 15. Accusing the CM of using the caste census as a political tool against some communities, Kumaraswamy asked: 'There are 101 castes under the IIa category, and there's a 15 per cent reservation. Who has taken the largest share of this?' The veiled reference was to Siddaramaiah's own Kuruba community, which is currently in the IIa category. The report recommends that it be moved to the 'most backward category' of Ib, where, critics say, it would get a bigger slice of the quota pie.
CUT AND THRUSTK.M. Ramachandrappa, president of the Karnataka State Backward Castes Federation, and a Kuruba leader, has a ready riposte. 'Let them bring information about Kurubas. I, too, will bring information about how Vokkaligas have benefited. Let's both discuss publicly,' he says. Each of the previous commission reports, he points out, had faced resistance from forward castes. The government, he says, should release the full data of the 2024 report to remove ambiguities, if any. 'There are many small communities that still don't know where they stand. We don't have clear information about whom all the state's programmes have reached over the past 50 years,' says Ramachandrappa.Detailed data is exactly what many ministers had sought at the April 17 cabinet meet, according to law minister H.K. Patil. Even if the Siddaramaiah government is treading cautiously, that perhaps is the only real long-term cure for confusion. Caste is a political hot potato, but the Congress has taken it upon itself to peel it for the greater good.Subscribe to India Today MagazineMust Watch