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Survey is 'mere documentation', says Census Director

By Our Special Correspondent

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM July 4 . The Census Director, Sheela Thomas, said here today that the survey of churches and mosques was merely an exercise to document these places of worship.

Participating in a `meet the press' programme, Ms. Thomas said that the questionnaire prepared by the Census Directorate was circulated among prominent personalities belonging to the Christian and Muslim communities, including religious scholars. The churches and mosques had been classified into two categories - pre-1900 and post-1900. The Census Directorate, owing to its staffing pattern, had entrusted the work to the District Collectors.

She said the decision to start the inter-censal survey had been taken in January 2001 and the format and schedule had been approved in July 2001. This was circulated among members of seminaries and Muslim scholars, not to mention Census Directors in other States. A senior official of the Census Department had met the senior IUML leaders, Panakkad Mohammadali Shihab Thangal and Kanthapuram Aboobacker Musaliar, both of whom assured full backing to the proposal.

The final schedule had been sent to the Registrar General of India and the controversy broke out at a time when the Census officials were awaiting formal clearance. She said the department had conducted a pilot study of 30 churches and 18 mosques before preparing the schedule.

When asked whether the survey would be called off, Ms. Thomas said that it had not started officially. She had no information from the Registrar General of India about the fate of the survey. Ms. Thomas said that no objection had been raised when the questionnaire had been prepared and circulated and that she could not understand the reasons for the current controversy.

She said the studies on churches and mosques were on the same lines of the one on the temples of Kerala. It proposed to draw a lot from the Directory of Christian Churches, published by the Deepika group of publications and the Directory of Muslim mosques, authored by N.A. Kareem. The Census Directorate had conducted several inter-censal studies. These included Fairs and Festivals of Kerala, Crafts of Kerala, town survey of Guruvayoor, etc.

Only the Census Directorate was equipped to collect data related to socio-cultural aspects. In reply to a question, she said that there was nothing secretive about the studies on churches and mosques. An advisory committee had been constituted to prepare the questionnaire, though its meeting was yet to be convened.

She said the Census Directorate had published the provisional figures. It had also initiated a work on primitive tribal groups of Kerala. When asked whether she would take a pro-active role in ensuring that the studies took off, Ms. Thomas said she had her own limitations as a Government servant, though she felt that the documentation of churches and mosques would be of immense help to researchers.

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