Social Divide:

May 24/2011: The Union Cabinet, in a recent meet, has unanimously resolved to include caste and religion in the current Census data collection process. It is claimed that this step will pin point economically backward people even better. Last year, in the Group of Ministers (GoM) meet, there were differences in opinion about including caste in the Census. People of this country were happy that politicians could finally understand the crisis hitting the Indian society because of this kind of a pide. They were pleased that their leaders would resist such a move. Yet, the final decision was awaited.

Now this decision to include caste and religion has been reinvigorated. It will be obvious to anyone contemplating this issue that such a move will pervert society at large. Religious fanaticism has been on the rise in India. Minorities have become even more aggressive in their outlook in the hope that this will scare away the majority and keep them at bay.  With international Islamic movements getting hyper, it is imperative that India takes care of all aspects before embarking on a move that has every possibility of furthering the cause of pisive forces.

To gain or retain the benefits of ‘reservation’ many caste based agitations have been seen in the past. Some may argue that tradition of castes in India is a historical truth. Furthering that line it may also be said that since the Constitution of India acknowledges caste, there is nothing wrong when Census takes these realities into account. These people should take into consideration that first, the number of castes described in the Constitution are nowhere near what the figures are today. Second, every day new sub castes are emanating from the existing set up. Thereby, it is evident that in every state there are different sub castes taking birth on a regular basis and the problem now is to give all of them a social ground. To add to the castes and sub castes claiming recognition is the ‘OBCs’. Politics, education, jobs and now even in the armed forces this mind set of religion based census has brought about an upheaval which may not be felt immediately but would surely raise its ugly head sometime in the future.

If we term all Indians from the southern states as ‘Madrasis’ and all those from above the Vindhyas as ‘Hindoostanis’ then a new pision is created. Similarly the way people dress, food they eat and skin color also highlights pisions that India really does not deserve to bring up into consideration. If all want to make this nation crumble then let us all get together to smash it into smithereens. There is no dearth of leaders like Mulayam, Laloo, Mayawati and many others who, to create vote banks, will be very happily willing to create castes within castes.

If the government really wants to know where the poor are, the only way is to see the economic index of the people, not their caste or religion. This opinion has an argument behind it. Census in India started first in 1872. This current 2011 Census is the 15th in number but after Independence it is the 7th such operation. Last caste based Census was carried out in 1931. Although the Constitution was framed many years after that exercise, BR Ambedkar and other luminaries involved in preparing the Constitution did not think it fit to create a permanent pide by including caste based Census as a mandatory operation every decade. We can safely assume that they must have discussed the issues thrown up by the 1931 caste based Census. Therefore, its non inclusion in the Constitution must have been prompted by unpleasant experiences by the people who created that document. It is quite possible those issues may not have been noted by historians for which we have no proof today as to why it was undone the way it has been done. It is also very likely that the Congress led UPA 2 government has not bothered to delve into these details. It has definitely not tried to find out the reasons for which the Census was being worked out as it was till now. Possibly to create vote banks and appease some loud mouthed casteist politicians, today’s government is doing a somersault.

As far as we understand, getting a proper BPL list prepared would do the job of locating the real poor. Instead of that exercise being perfected, perverting the Census by raising social points will only further pide and dilute the India of today. The Census needs to be very detailed but not necessarily in terms of social pisions which will hamper the unity of this country which is very fragile as it is.