A census is not about counting sheep -Seema Chishti

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published Published on Sep 23, 2022   modified Modified on Sep 23, 2022

-The Hindu

The Census in India is about many things — it must be made a priority and used to affirm a sense of comradeship

Among the best uses of a census anywhere in the world was perhaps what happened in the United States when, in 1850 and 1860, anti-slavery campaigners used numbers from two consecutive national censuses to build support for the abolition of slavery. They showed the number of enslaved people in the U.S. to be rising — contrary to arguments made by pro-slavery politicians. There have been numerous instances of such revelations using the census.

A case of the missing census

India’s first Census was held in 1872, conducted non-synchronously in different parts of the country. After that, India has held its decadal censuses regularly from 1881 to 2011, despite diseases, world wars, Partition and other instances of turmoil. Citing COVID-19 as an excuse for its postponement now runs thin, as the Government thought it fit to allow large election rallies in the middle of a deadly second wave of the pandemic, that was criminally mismanaged. But there is no tradition of anyone being answerable and explaining why the largest democracy, once held in awe for its ability to make its people count regularly, is not doing so now. As there is no official reassurance that India will not skip its decadal Census, we can declare that we have a case of the missing census.

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The Hindu, 23 September, 2022, https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/a-census-is-not-about-counting-sheep/article65923640.ece?homepage=true


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