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The Print
5 days ago
- Business
- The Print
Long-pending census exercise to be held in 2 phases over next 3 yrs, will include caste data
According to a statement by the government, the reference date for Population Census 2027 will be 00:00 hours of 1 March, 2027. The long pending exercise will be conducted after 14 years. The last was conducted in 2010. New Delhi: In a major development, the Centre Wednesday announced that the population census exercise will be held in two phases along with the enumeration of castes, in the next three years. For the Union Territory of Ladakh and the non-synchronous snow-bound areas of the UT of Jammu and Kashmir and States of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, the reference date will be 00.00 hours of 1 October, 2026. The notification with the above reference dates will be published in the official gazette tentatively on 16 June 2025, as per the provision of section 3 of Census Act 1948, the statement said. According to a source in the government, the process of census begins with issuance of the notification. 'The notification of intent will be published in the official gazette on 16 June, 2025, tentatively. The second and final phase of the census will begin in February 2027 and conclude on 1 March, 2027,' the source said. The Census of India is conducted under the provisions of the Census Act, 1948, and the Census Rules, 1990. The last Census of India was conducted in 2011 in two phases. In phase I, house listing was done from 1 April to 30 September, 2010. In phase II, population enumeration was done on 9 February to 28 February 2011, with reference date 00:00 hours of 1 March 2011, except for snow-bound non-synchronous areas of Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh for which it was conducted during 11 to 30 September 2010 with reference date as 00.00 hours of the first day of October 2010. Also Read: BrahminGenes Anuradha Tiwari has launched a war on caste census. 'A betrayal by Modi govt' Enumeration of caste alongside enumeration of population What is new in this exercise is also that the enumeration of caste will also take place alongside enumeration of population. Caste was never included in any census since Independence. The Congress-led UPA government had, in 2011, enumerated caste data as part of its Socio-Economic and Caste Census (SECC), but the figures were never made public. The Modi-led NDA government had in 2021 ruled out a caste census. In a reply to Lok Sabha, the Centre had said that it had decided, as a matter of policy, not to enumerate caste-wise data beyond SCs and STs. In its affidavit submitted in the Supreme Court, the Centre had said that 'population Census is not the ideal instrument for collection of details on caste' as 'the operational difficulties are so many that there is a grave danger that basic integrity of census data may be compromised and the fundamental population could itself get distorted'. Since then, the BJP had maintained an ambiguous stance on the issue, often accusing the Congress of using the caste census demand to create societal divisions. But in April the government announced that caste enumeration will be part of the next census exercise. A delay due to COVID-19 The Census 2021 was also proposed to be conducted in two phases in a similar manner with phase I during April-September 2020 and second phase in February 2021. This, however, could not materialise. 'All the preparations for the first phase of the Census to be conducted in 2021 were completed and field work was scheduled to begin in some states and UTs from 1 April, 2020. However, due to the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic across the country, the census work was postponed,' the statement said. (Edited by Viny Mishra)
The Print
05-05-2025
- Politics
- The Print
From ‘destroyer of GC Hindus' to ‘Maulana Modi' jibes, BJP's new opposition is arising from within
'Terrorists asked your religion. Now government will ask your caste,' posted a user, Anuradha Tiwari, whose bio on X reads, '#OneFamilyOneReservation and #BrahminGenes'. The irony was not lost on a section of Hindutva supporters. A large number of them took to social media to express their shock, betrayal and disgust with the announcement. New Delhi: A day after the Pahalgam attack, the X account of Chhattisgarh unit of Bharatiya Janata Party posted: ' Dharma poocha, jaati nahi…Yaad rakhenge (They asked the religion, not caste…will remember). Just a week later, the Narendra Modi government unexpectedly announced the caste census. Addressing a press conference on the decision, Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that former prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru had called the caste census 'anti-vikas (anti-development)', and it was under Modi that the historic decision was finally being taken. But Hindutva supporters, for whom Nehru has hitherto been the most preferred punching bag, immediately switched sides. 'Is this the reason Bhimta Janata Party and Bhimta Modi spread hate against chad Kashmiri Brahmin Nehru?' remarked a user. 'Respect to Nehru.' Another user posted: 'Today I understand why he (Nehru) was called a visionary.' And it is not just about the caste census. There is a much larger online ecosystem, which has moved to the Far-Right. For them, the BJP and the RSS are cowardly secularists, undeserving of the Hindu community's faith. Albeit shrill and extremely polarised, the mainstream BJP-RSS ecosystem has thus far worked hard to ensure that the wedge remains buried under the rug. But slowly, it is spilling out in the open. With the BJP set to complete 11 years in power, a loud and unforgiving new opposition has emerged against it. What makes it particularly threatening is that it has emerged from within the Hindutva movement. It is the emergence of the extreme right-wing, for which BJP is not only 'too secular', but an active betrayer of Hindus. Much like the 'Make America Great Again' movement in the US pushed the right-wing consensus further right, thereby upending all the internal logics of American politics themselves, this new Hindutva Alt-Right too threatens to destabilise the ideological politics of BJP and RSS. 'In last eleven years of absolute power, Modi/BJP/RSS destroyed GC (General Caste) Hindus,' Ritu Rathaur, who calls herself a 'Civilizational Hindu activist' on X, wrote. 'No other party did this mass level destruction to GC Hindus, the way BJP has done.' Mandal commission -Proposed and implemented by Sanghis/BJP Minority commission- set up by Sanghis and VP singh Weaponisation of SC/ST act against non SC Hindus – Modi/bjp Hisab chukta politics based on poorvajon ka paap- Modi/bjp/rss Reservation breach of 50% – Modi/bjp/rss… — Ritu #सत्यसाधक (@RituRathaur) May 1, 2025 A handle called 'Gems of BJP' posted: 'Make a list of all those right wing accounts which are licking *** of M*** after Caste Census. They are your real enemy.' The account's bio reads: 'A proud Hindu. Proving that BJP is a Hindu hating Party and we need a new party to counter it. Want Yogi ji as PM soon.' Just last week, the same ecosystem of Hindutva activists and influencers were on a tirade against the Modi government over the deadly terrorist attack in Pahalgam in Kashmir. The Modi government systematically weakened the Indian Army by bringing down its strength by 1,80,000 by not recruiting any personnel for three straight years, Rathaur had posted a day after the Pahalgam attack. The purported reason according to her? To fund 'Saugat-e-Modi', a festive kit distributed on Eid as part of the BJP's outreach to Muslims, along with 300 other schemes for Muslims. 'The man you think of as Hindu Hridya Samrat is a closet Maulana who is accelerating your genocide,' she wrote in another post, warning Hindus to 'wake up to this truth'. 'Maulana Modi ji worked so hard to convince Hindus to visit Kashmir as tourists,' wrote Madhu Kishwar, an author and commentator, who had ironically been a strong voice of support for Prime Minister Narendra Modi before 2014. Gradually, she moved to the social media camp for whom he is 'Maulana Modi', and a betrayer of Hindus. 'Happy Day for Modi ji who cut short his romance with Saudi royals! to celebrate the valour of Jihadeez, which included gross forms of humiliation of Kafirs before slaughtering them,' she added. Slaughter of Kafirs in Pahalgam: A Return Gift to @narendramodi ji by his Fellow Mazhabeez . The message of terrorists: "Tell this to Modi"–clearly indicates who inspired them to commit these heinous murders. Maulana Modi ji worked so hard to convince Hindus to visit Kashmir as… — Madhu Purnima Kishwar (@madhukishwar) April 23, 2025 Tagging the Prime Minister, Ashish Joshi, another X user, said that Modi has 'utterly failed the Hindus of Bharat'. 'It's time he steps down and the #PseudoHindutva BJP-RSS is dismantled and cast into the gutter of history. We Hindus can manage the rest,' he posted. A week before the Pahalgam attack, it was the row over the remarks of BJP MP Nishikant Dubey, who said that Chief Justice of India Sanjeev Khanna was behind 'civil wars' in the country for stalling the Waqf law, and got a rap on the knuckles by party president J.P. Nadda for it. Within hours of his statement, support for Dubey exploded online, with dozens of posts on X claiming that Dubey's opinion was not his personal one, but 'the opinion of 90 percent of voters who vote for the #BJP', and reposts running in thousands. The battleline was drawn more sharply than ever before—it was Dubey against Nadda, and 'moderate' and 'compromised' BJP against 'real', 'gutsy' Hindutva supporters. As Kishwar said, 'Nominal Hindus are worse than non-Hindus. These people (BJP-RSS) are nominal Hindus…They use our civilisational wounds for their gains, and leave us bleeding.' She told ThePrint, 'When I began to see through them about a decade ago, I was one of the few voices, but now thanks to their truth coming out on social media, there's a flood of voices, who can see through them.' Indeed, on X alone, there are dozens of such handles, which claim allegiance to Hindutva ideology, but are bitter, unforgiving critics of the Modi government, BJP, and its ideological mentor, RSS. They are tired of the BJP and RSS's monopoly over Hindutva, them not standing up for Hindus, their 'appeasement' of Muslims, their 'failure' to put the incorrigible community in its place, the government's censorship of the 'authentic voice' of Hindus, and of its 'overtures' to the Dalit community at the cost of the upper castes, especially Brahmins. On X, they call those from the Sangh 'Songis', run hashtags like 'RSS Mukt Bharat' and 'Maulana Modi', and identify themselves as warriors against their 'Pseudo Hindutva'. On YouTube, their shows questioning the authority of RSS as a spokesperson for Hindus have lakhs of views. A tweet from the prime minister on Eid is enough to send them into a tizzy. For their part, the BJP government, the party and the RSS maintain a strict public silence on these groups, which they privately dismiss as a 'fringe' and 'vocal minority'. Some from this camp are simply publicity-hungry, they say. Others are a disgruntled lot who failed to be a part of the new post-2014 durbar, despite their desperately demonstrated sycophancy. Yet, it could also be a more 'insidious' force trying to puncture Hindutva from within, they caution. But most significantly, some members and supporters of the Sangh Parivar privately argue that this 'fringe' represents the wounded angst of the upper castes, especially Brahmins, who cannot digest the all-encompassing Hindu identity constructed by Hindutva, for which the likes of Ambedkar and Phule have to be accommodated, reservation cannot be questioned, and the 'supremacy' of Brahmins can never be publicly asserted. While the angst of the upper castes may be the most plausible, or at least, privately the most cited, explanation for this phenomenon, these groups signal a significant new development in the grand march of Hindutva. Also Read: Modi govt's selective embrace of RSS ideologue Deendayal Upadhyaya's ideology in policymaking From Murshidabad to Waqf—anger against 'Maulana Modi' 'Jinke saamne meri ma-behen-betiyon ka balatkar ho raha hai, jinke saamne mere mandiron ka vidhvansh kiya ja raha hai…' a white bearded, bespectacled man is heard saying as he cries inconsolably in a video clip on X. He is talking about the violence in West Bengal's Murshidabad, which erupted amid anti-Waqf law protests. Sporting a t-shirt with pictures of BJP's lotus symbol, Narendra Modi and Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Saini, it is easy to imagine that the man is a BJP supporter, complaining about the treatment being purportedly meted out to Hindus under Mamata Banerjee's rule. But as the man continues his animated outrage, one is in for a surprise. 'Indira kaal mein hota toh maan lete, Nehru kaal mein hota toh maan lete, Sonia ke samay mein hota toh maan lete… Arey jise main bhagwan Krishna maan ke apne seene mein baithaye rakha tha, uske samay mein aisi peedha… (Had it occurred in Indira, Nehru or Sonia's time, we would have accepted, but such pain in the reign of the one who I thought was Lord Krishna…),' he says, beating his chest. 'Modi ji, pandrah saal khapa diye aapko wahan tak pohonchane ke liye, aur das saal se aapke peeche lage huye hain kia ap isse Hindu Rashtra banaoge… (Modi ji, we spent 15 years to bring you to that stage, and have been hoping for 10 years that you'll make this a Hindu Rashtra…).' He goes on to question why there is no President's Rule in West Bengal yet. The unidentified old man's video was heavily circulated, shared by X handles, like 'Voice of Hindus', and 'Gems of BJP'. For the Hindutva Alt-Right, the Murshidabad violence became one of the latest examples of Modi government's purported insensitivity to Hindus. Why else would the Centre not have imposed President's Rule in Bengal, several of them asked. But even before the violence in Murshidabad had erupted, the Alt-right groups lampooned the law for 'minority appeasement'. Consider Kishwar's unabashed critique of the law. 'IT IS SHOCKING THAT BRAIN DAMAGED MODI MEGAPHONES are oblivious to the BIG FRAUD against Hindus through the nautanki of Waqf Law Amendment,' she had posted on 3 April, a day after the law was passed by Parliament. IT IS SHOCKING THAT BRAIN DAMAGED MODI MEGAPHONES are oblivious to the BIG FRAUD against Hindus through the nautanki of Waqf Law Amendment: "Home Minister Amit Shah stated in Parliament that the Waqf boards owned 18 lakh acres of land from 1913 to 2013. However, 21 lakh acres… — Madhu Purnima Kishwar (@madhukishwar) April 3, 2025 'PLEASE NOTE that Maulana Modi is ensuring that neither any state govt nor any wronged Hindu whose property has been forcibly taken away can reclaim or challenge the looted property,' she wrote. A slowly building angst However, these episodes of outbursts are only symptoms. The Alt-Right's angst has been quietly building for years. 'A few years into the Modi government, we realised that our hopes are being dashed, and this man is an opportunist, no different from the Congress,' said one of the people behind an Alt-Right X handle, on condition of anonymity. 'But for me, personally, the final blow came when the government punished Nupur Sharma for telling the truth, and blatantly took the side of Islamists,' they said. 'After that, all these gestures for Pasmandas, Saugat-e-Modi, etc. have exposed them completely…Even for waqf, they are clearly saying they will use the property for Muslim empowerment. How is this the government headed by a so-called Hindu Hriday Samrat?' In the last few years, there has been a proliferation of websites, X handles and YouTube channels, which claim to put forth what they call the 'Indic' and Sanatani point of view. In the context of the controversy over Dubey's remarks, Jaipur Dialogues, an X handle named eponymously after the YouTube channel formed in 2016 by retired IAS officer Sanjay Dixit, author of the book All Religions Are Not The Same, shared a collage with the caption: 'True Heroes of Hindutva in our Political Domain. Do you agree?' True Heros of Hindutva in our Political Domain Do you agree? 🔥 — The Jaipur Dialogues (@JaipurDialogues) April 21, 2025 It included images of Nupur Sharma, who was suspended by BJP for her remarks on the Prophet, Telangana BJP MLA T. Raja Singh who was booked for hate speech last year, BJP MLA Ramesh Bidhuri who got a notice from the party for abusing a Muslim MP in Parliament when he was an MP in 2023, and Dubey. Clearly, for Dixit, who along with his guests, often questions the 'secularism' and 'compromised moderateness' of the BJP and RSS, Dubey's case was not an aberration, but part of a larger trend of the party's equivocalness when it comes to 'Hindu causes'. Some of the more structural grievances discussed by these groups are the government's failure to free Hindu temples from government control and implement the National Register of Citizens (NCR) nationwide, the rise of beef exports under its rule, delays in implementing the Uniform Civil Code (UCC), and not changing the curriculums 'enough'. 'Was shocked to see that the updated NCERT civics book is now teaching the fraudulent 'Sacchar committee' report to the class 8th student,' Rathaur wrote in a post, for instance. 'This is the poison that Modi govt is now teaching our kids. Terrifying.' For this Alt-Right ecosystem, negotiation or the Sangh's preferred strategy of 'assimilation' of Muslims in Hindu culture is not an option. For them, you are either a Hindutva supporter or a secularist apologist. Rathaur, Kishwar and M. Nageswara Rao, a retired Indian Police Service officer, are among the most prominent faces of this new Alt-Right. Last month, they participated in a seminar in the national capital, titled 'Fate of Hindus under Sangh Parivar'. Its purpose, Rao told ThePrint, was to educate Hindus about Hindu existential issues, and demonstrate to them how the Sangh Parivar, including the BJP, have become the world's greatest Hindu 'drohis (traitors)', so that they start thinking and questioning. 'They (BJP-RSS) do little to actually address Hindu concerns, despite the polarisation orchestrated by their cadres on the ground,' he said. 'Waqf, triple talaq, etc. are not Hindu concerns. Why do they not talk about freeing temples from government control? It is because they don't want Hindus to have an awakening.' To Rao, RSS's creation itself is shrouded in secrecy, and therefore, its actions cannot be taken at face value. Such is the proclivity to conspiracy theories among the Alt-Right that for them, nothing is beyond the needle of suspicion. Common conspiracy theories among these handles are the RSS being inspired by a secret society in medieval Europe called Freemasonry, Modi being trained by the American Council of Young Political Leaders (ACYPL)—purportedly linked to the CIA—during his stay in the US in the 90s as BJP general secretary, and thus being a 'plant', and Modi administering the Covid vaccines at the behest of pharma companies in the US. 'When will Indians realise that RSS is the most dangerous militant illuminati, the highly despicable freemasonry that haunts their politics from behind?' posted a handle called 'Janamejayan', for instance. 'Probably never,' responded another user named 'Rati #ProtectWithPen'. 'Hindus have fallen into the trap of never questioning their 'leaders'. They don't even want a Dharmic model anymore. They just want to swallow 'predigested food'. Few are brave to question. Fewer are brave enough to contemplate on the question.' Also Read: Why Ambedkar remains a conundrum for RSS Caste—the elephant in the room While this group's online politics has been building for many years, the caste census could be the tipping point. 'The caste census has come as a shock to people within the Sangh, too,' a professor affiliated to the Sangh Parivar said, on condition of anonymity. 'Of course, the next step would be to ask for reservation. The upper castes have already been feeling that they have been given a rough deal for a while… Their resentment will only grow,' he conceded. 'For some time, you can say that they cannot go to anyone else… But you cannot take them for granted.' But caste has been the elephant in the room for many years. Insiders claim that the extreme hate for Muslims among the Alt-Right is only a veneer for its upper-caste anxieties, which will be triggered more due to the announcement of the caste census. 'These voices have been growing since 2017-18,' said another professor, also a member of the Sangh Parivar, requesting anonymity. 'They conjure up all kinds of justifications for their angst, but the truth is that it is caste that lies at the core of it all.' In 2018, about ten people 'mentored' by Nageswara Rao had sent 'A Charter of Hindu Demands' to the prime minister, which included demands like freeing Hindu temples, and allowing the establishment of religious educational institutions for Hindus like the minorities. After this charter was sent, the government marked these groups as a 'threat', and a conscious decision was taken to not engage with them, the professor claimed. 'They might outrage over the prime minister's Eid Mubarak tweets, but their actual problem is the expansion of the BJP to include all castes—it is not the Brahmin-Thakur party they had hoped it would be before 2014.' He said, 'They are mostly disgruntled upper castes, like the Rajputs in the North and Brahmins in the South, who make these noises. It is clearly their caste psychology at play,' he said. 'Theoretically, you think you are superior, but in actuality, your material condition does not correspond to your mental image of yourself, so you lash out.' While several of these voices can be of those who expected rewards for their sycophancy, the elephant in the room as far as they are concerned is indeed caste, agrees Abhijit-Iyer Mitra, a defence analyst and right-wing commentator. According to him, the Hindutva Alt-Right can be divided in three categories—those who are disgruntled because they were not made part of the new post-2014 durbar, those who are disillusioned because their material reality did not change post 2014, and those who are plain casteist. The caste argument is hard to miss, when one reads the subtext of the angst. Lawyer and author J. Sai Deepak, who too has criticised the RSS in the past, had said at a book launch last year, 'This is the most raging internal debate that has to be addressed because this viral has infected our ideology.' Not naming the RSS or any other organisation, he had said that many within the Hindutva force have made the choice of alienating the Brahmins, and co-opting the 'Jihadis'. 'You cannot say I'm going to unify Hinduism by making one group the punching bag of your positions,' he had added. 'What is your message to those who subscribe to the rules of the Vedas? Because the Vedic Sanatana Dharma happens to be the core of the Sanatana Dharma—the epicentre of this entire ocean that has been created. So, what are you telling those institutions? Are you asking us to leave this country?' From outrage over Modi prostrating in front of a statue of Ambedkar to the BJP-RSS accommodating 'Hindu-hating' icons like him and Phule, the outrage of the Alt-Right is often directed at what it sees as 'Dalit appeasement'. 'The real minority is the general category, Both BJP and Congress are eliminating merit from the country, soon reservation will be 100 percent,' a user from this ecosystem posted, for instance. In fact, the 'hisab chukta' remark by Modi in 2022—in which he had said, speaking of lower castes, that if someone has been oppressed so brutally through their childhood, will they not pay back if they get an opportunity—is often invoked as an example of the BJP's 'anti-Brahmin' outlook. 'Modi sir's 'Hisab Chukta' policy is in full swing,' posted Rathaur, for example. '…blood boils listening to these ambekarite girls spewing such hate for our Lord Ram and Krishna,' she wrote in a post with a video of two women invoking Ambedkar's critique of Hinduism. 'Thank you, Modi sir for being the architect, thank you for enabling this hate on our devtas, thank you for doing something which even Muslims won't ever dare to say. And thanks to all Hindus who vote for Modi and get their gods abused.' (Edited by Mannat Chugh) Also Read: Narayana Guru's religious secularism—what makes the reformer-ascetic a puzzle for modern politicians
