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The broad plan for Census 2011 – before the Prime Minister's announcement of May 7 – was to get it done in two phases. The first phase would involve housing surveys, while the second phase would involve actual headcount. The housing surveys are being conducted in several States and the headcount is expected to begin from February 2011.
As per the original plan, data on 15 demographic and socio-economic parameters such as age, sex, religion, literacy, mother tongues/languages known, economic activity and status, migration and S.C./S.T. status were to be collected. According to Home Ministry officials working closely with the RGI, the task in the second phase would become harder if the government's May 7 promise in Parliament is to be kept. Chidambaram himself had drawn attention to this aspect during the debate in the Lok Sabha when he said that the census enumerator is not an investigator or verifier and that the person has no training or expertise to classify a citizen as a member of the OBC or otherwise. |
