With a few months left in the forthcoming parliamentary election to be slated next year, , all the parties are continuously putting their best in a bid to prove their mettle. In the assembly elections held in 5 states last month, many parties including the ruling BJP and the main opposition Congress were eyeball to eyeball on the issue of caste based- census. The matter was once again echoed in the Haryana Assembly. Raising the issue in the assembly session, one of the Congress MLAs demanded to carry out caste based-census in Haryana with an immediate effect. However, regarding this matter, the BJP government has repeatedly said that there is no need for this. Of course, the caste census has not been conducted in Haryana, but a few months ago, under the Pariva02r Pehchan Patra (PPP)Scheme, the figures pertaining to the families of General, SC, BC and Backward Classes have been revealed in Haryana. There is a lot of contradiction between many parties including the ruling BJP and Congress at the Center and the states on the issue of caste census. Congress is continuously demanding that the process of caste census should be initiated as soon as possible. Congress is saying that the government deliberately does not want to conduct the caste census. Congress is also preparing for a big movement regarding this. Congress is raising the issue both inside and outside the House. On the other hand, the ruling BJP says that having caste based census will lead to a divided society and far reaching implications.
Pertaining to the matter, a few months ago, clarifying his stand, Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar said that there is no such demand of caste census in Haryana and the BJP never supported the caste-based politics and census. The BJP-led government is already working for the welfare of the poor and needy people and it’s above the caste census.
A few months ago, caste-based population data was shared by the government and prior to this, no such official information was made available. Since the figures of the caste-based population of the state have now come to the fore, all the parties are working on this angle in a bid to woo the voters. It is pertinent to mention that SC and BC communities constitute a sizable chunk of vote bank as well as population which has forced all political parties to focus on the votes belonging to both communities. The data revealed that people from SC and BC category in Haryana constitute about 51 percent of the total vote population. Based on the data, there are a total of 1368365 families of SC category in Haryana which represent 20.71 percent of the total families. Similarly, the number of BC (A) and BC (B) families is 1123852 and 869079 constituting 16.52 percent and 12.78 percent of the total families. Out of the total verified 68 lakh families and 2.83 crore people in Haryana, there are a total of 1368365 SC families and the number of people from the families is 5861131 which constitutes 20.71 percent of the total families. Similarly, the number of people from BC (A) and BC (B) category families is 4793312 and 3797306 constituting 16.93 percent and 13.41 percent respectively. On the other hand, the number of BC (A) and BC (B) category families is 4793312 and 3797306 respectively.