Rahul Gandhi welcomes govt's 'sudden' caste census decision, wants timeline for its implementation

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said his party demands that the government make provisions for funds as soon as possible and start the work of census and caste census with complete transparency while accusing PM of 'avoiding' the implementation of social justice policy by claiming that the the opposition was 'dividing the society' on the lines of caste.

New Delhi: Insisting for a “people’s census” instead of a “bureaucratic census”, top Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday said their pressure forced Modi government to act on Caste Census after "11 years of opposing it", as he asked for a timeline for its implementation and emphasised on asking "relevant questions" during the exercise.

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said his party demands that the government make provisions for funds as soon as possible and start the work of census and caste census with complete transparency while accusing Prime Minister of "avoiding" the implementation of social justice policy by claiming that the the opposition was "dividing the society" on the lines of caste.

Welcoming the decision even as the decadal Census operations are delayed, Rahul said Caste Census is only a first step that provides answers on the participation of OBCs, Dalits and Adivasis in institutions and power structure and offered Congress' expertise to design the exercise, highlighting the party-led Telangana government's experience in conducting the caste survey.

Addressing a press conference hours after the government announced conducting caste enumeration with decadal Census, he said, "we don't know what happened. After 11 years of opposing it, they have suddenly announced this. We support this completely but we want a timeline. We want to know when it will be done."

He said the next step after the caste count is to implement reservation in private educational institutions guaranteed by Article 15(5) and the breaching of the existing 50% cap on quota.

Rahul refused to speculate on why the Modi government took the decision when he was asked whether the Bihar election was the reason or whether the government wanted to divert attention from the Pahalgam terror attack.

"I don't know...Speculation is your area. I don't speculate. I work on facts...He (Modi) took a big step...I want to know when the Caste Census will be held and how it will be done, what kind of questions will be asked. If you don't ask relevant questions, then there is no point...We want people's Census, we don't want bureaucratic census," he said.

He said caste census is a first step of a completely new development paradigm in the country and they would be going to push it one way or the other.

"It does not matter what the BJP thinks. We have shown that we can pressure the BJP into doing the Caste Census. We are going to show that we are going to pressure the BJP in implementing Article 15(5) and removing the 50% quota cap," he said.

Rahul said his immediate suspicion is that the government is adopting a strategy that it took on Women's Bill and expressed hope that "better sense prevails".

Hard selling the caste survey conducted by Congress-led Telangana government, he said it is a model for the exercise and there is a "lot of difference" from the one conducted in Bihar. He said the questionnaire in Telangana was developed through wide consultation.

The Telangana survey showed that there was not a single OBC, Dalit and Adivasi in the top echelons of the corporate world.

"I am not saying not even 1%, I am saying there is not even one OBC, Dalit or Adivasi in the corporate world in Hyderabad. But if you take gig workers, which I call modern slavery, all of them are either OBC, Dalit or Adivasi. There are two streams, one is that of labourers, poor and unemployed and the another of a small elite who controls the system. Adani and Ambani sit on top of this system," he said.