Hyderabad : In a significant push for a more accurate caste enumeration, the Telangana assembly on Friday unanimously passed a resolution urging the Centre to modify the Census 2027 questionnaire to explicitly include Other Backward Classes (OBCs) as a separate category and adopt pre-verified caste lists to ensure reliable caste data for policymaking and welfare programmes.
Introducing the resolution, BC welfare minister Ponnam Prabhakar said the Telangana govt had conducted a comprehensive Socio-Economic, Educational, Employment, Political and Caste (SEEEPC) Survey in 2024. Based on this report, the state legislative assembly passed constitutional bills granting 42% reservation to BCs in local body elections, educational admissions, and govt jobs. The minister said the Socio-Economic and Caste Census (SECC) 2011 was undertaken to identify various caste groups, including SCs, STs and OBCs, and estimate their population shares to facilitate targeted welfare interventions. In contrast, he said, the Telangana govt‘s 2024 survey produced more reliable results by using pre-defined and clearly classified caste lists during the enumeration process. Referring to the Union govt’s Aug 14 notification, Prabhakar said the ministry of home affairs had issued a 40-question schedule for the second phase of Census 2027. 10, respondents are required to identify themselves as belonging to ‘SC/ST/OC.
“Due to the absence of pre-verified caste lists and the use of ambiguous open-ended questions, millions of caste names were recorded inconsistently, making data coding impossible. “The survey confirmed that BCs constitute the largest proportion of the state’s population.
This, it said, would allow enumerators to select castes directly from pre-loaded lists, reduce errors, and ensure greater accuracy in data collection. These Bills are currently pending approval and assent from the President of India,” he said. Consequently, this valuable data became unusable for policymaking,” Ponnam said. Reverting to an open-ended format, he said, the exercise risked repeating the shortcomings that affected previous caste data collection efforts.
The assembly also urged the Centre to incorporate officially recognised caste lists of BCs, as identified by both the central and state govts, into the digital census platform in advance. Under column No. The minister argued that the omission of OBCs as a distinct category could result in inaccurate and unreliable enumeration of the country’s largest social group.