Teachers to conduct caste census from April 11

It is official! The Government has decided to rope in teachers as enumerators for the caste census that will be conduced from April 11 to April 30.

Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who chaired a meeting of Deputy Commissioners, Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of Zilla Panchayats and released guidelines for the census, told presspersons on Monday that all legal hurdles had been cleared as the census would be conducted during the summer vacation.

A government order pertaining to the deployment of teachers for the census had been issued on January 3. It had also been decided to pay a remuneration of Rs. 6,000 to the teachers and fifty per cent would be paid in advance, he said.

Mr. Siddaramaiah directed the officials to ensure that the enumeration was conducted in a scientific manner. “Every enumerator will have to collect details pertaining to 55 listed questions from 120 to 150 households and malpractices will not be tolerated,” he said.

Social Welfare Minister. H. Anjaneya said it was a major exercise as it was being done for the first time after 1931. It would give the government a new yardstick while deciding on the facilities to be provided to people of different castes and communities, he said.

He said Bharat Electronics Ltd. (BEL) had designed special software for compiling the enumeration details. Data entry operators will be deployed in every district to compile the data on a day-to-day basis, he said.