With just five days left for completion of the Census 2011 enumeration phase, the number of calls received by the Chennai Corporation's toll-free helpline – 1913 – is on the rise.
Persistent calls of residents who were not covered in the house-listing and housing census last year have started to yield results but some are yet to be covered in the enumeration. Over 200 calls pertaining to Census 2011 were received by the Chennai Corporation on Wednesday alone.
G. Arumugam, a resident of Nehru Nagar near Guindy check post, was not covered in the house-listing. As the enumeration officials did not come to his house, he called the helpline last week. After waiting for some days, he started to call 1913 at regular intervals and finally got enumerated on Wednesday.
“I have got enumerated after fighting hard for being counted,” said Mr.Arumugam. However, J. Brinda, a resident of Kodambakkam is among the persons who are waiting for the enumerators. “I was not covered in the house-listing last year. I called 1913 and placed a request, but the officials are yet to come,” she added.
“We want the people answering calls to 1913 to give us the date on which the enumerator would come to our house,” she added.
Jayakrishna Kumar, who called the Corporation helpline a few days ago, said that the officials asked him to wait patiently for the enumerators to come to his house. “As we are hearing about the link between the census and issue of Unique Identification Cards, we are scared of being left out,” he said.
G. Vijayaraghavan, a resident of Ashok Nagar, said that the officials should generate a reference number for residents who called 1913 with request for being enumerated. “As we were not counted in house-listing, we are requesting the officials to include us in the enumeration,” he said.
Chennai Corporation Commissioner D. Karthikeyan said the civic body had already completed more than 70 per cent of the enumeration work and the rest would be covered by this week. “All residents will be covered in the Census 2011. People need not panic,” he said. The Census 2011 began on February 9 and would be on till February 28.
