Telangana Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy
Credit: PTI Photo
Hyderabad: The Congress government in Telangana is making significant efforts to capitalise on the socio economic caste survey, which was a key promise made by the party during the 2023 assembly elections as part of its "BC Narrative" initiative.
The survey report was submitted to the cabinet sub committee headed by irrigation minister N Uttamm Kumar Reddy on Sunday.
The government is planning a special one-day session of the Telangana Assembly on Tuesday to discuss the caste survey report. This effort aims to galvanise support from backward classes (BCs) for the upcoming local body elections and subsequent elections.
The caste survey revealed that more than 50% of the total population in Telangana belongs to BCs.
The survey that was conducted by the state planning department was completed in just 50 days. Around 96.9% of Telangana households were surveyed, covering 354,775,554 individuals, making it the largest post-independence caste survey.
Around 94,863 enumerators and 9,628 supervisors were deployed across 94,261 Enumeration Blocks to conduct the survey. Over 76,000 data entry operators digitised the information within 36 days. The key challenges in conducting the survey include that 1.03 lakh houses were found locked, 1.68 lakh families were initially hesitant to participate, and 84,137 houses were misclassified due to non-residential usage or occupants being non-Telangana residents.
“The caste survey is a revolutionary step towards social justice. Now, informed and data-driven decisions can be taken for the welfare of the BCs,” said state irrigation minister and cabinet subcommittee on socio-economic survey chairman N Uttam Kumar Reddy.
The government will now decide the reservations threshold in the upcoming polls for local bodies. However, the survey has also sparked a political debate, with the opposition BRS describing the results as "misleading."
“The Congress government has presented misleading calculations regarding the BC caste census. According to the 2011 Census, Telangana had 83 lakh houses and a population of 3.5 crore. In 2014, KCR conducted a comprehensive survey, which revealed 1.03 crore houses and a population of 3.68 crore. Within just four years, the number of houses increased by 20 lakh. From 2014 to 2024, how many houses should have increased? What should the population be? How many new families should have been added? The Congress government's recent comprehensive caste census claims that Telangana now has 1.15 crore houses and a population of 3.7 crore. If the number of houses increased by 20 lakh between 2011 and 2014, then the next ten years (2014–2024) should have seen the addition of approximately 60 lakh new families,” said BRS MLC and former MP, K Kavitha.
She added that by any calculation, BCs in Telangana should be around 50-52%. But the Congress government claims BCs are only 46.2%, which is disappointing. Despite these misleading numbers, the Assembly should introduce a bill to increase BC reservations. “Elections should be conducted only after increasing reservations. The Congress party used similar deceptive tactics in Bihar and Karnataka and is now trying to deceive Telangana,” Kavitha said.
Ends//