Nitish Kumar asks Centre to reconsider its decision on caste census

The latest remarks of the Bihar Chief Minister has proved that all is not well in NDA as both JDU and BJP are running the government in an alliance but both are singing a different tune on one issue. The timing of the statement is also crucial as the stage is all set for the monsoon session of the Bihar legislature beginning from July 26, writes ETV Bharat's Amit Bhelari.

Patna:The JDU and BJP are once again locking horns over the caste census which the Centre has categorically denied. Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Friday urged the Centre to reconsider its decision and also reminded the BJP-led NDA government that the Bihar assembly had passed a proposal in 2019 and 2020 in this regard.

“In 2019 February and also in 2020 February Bihar assembly passed a proposal that the census should be on caste basis. You all know that I have been thinking about this issue since 1990 itself and I have talked about it several times on different occasions. I will request the centre to enumerate caste census at least once. In 2010 a caste census was conducted but no results were found. There was no outcome of that census which came out in 2013. That census was not even published. There was no report about the number of castes, “Nitish said after inaugurating 50 CNG buses in the state capital.

Earlier, while replying to a question in Parliament, the union minister of state for home Nityanand Rai had declared that no caste census other than SC, ST will take place. Two days back, even leader of opposition Tejashwi Prasad Yadav had taken a dig at the Centre for taking U-turn on caste census.

The latest remarks of the Bihar Chief Minister has proved that all is not well in NDA as both JDU and BJP are running the government in an alliance but both are singing a different tune on this issue. The timing of the statement is also crucial as the stage is all set for the monsoon session of the Bihar legislature beginning from July 26.

Nitish further said, “There has to be a caste-based census at least one time so that we can get the actual number especially the poor people. Apart from SC/STs the other section of the people will get the benefits and accordingly the schemes and policies could be made for their development. I would like to request the Centre to reconsider its decision. We want a caste based census but we have been informed in the parliament that it will not take place. Not only this, I have also sent the proposal and held talks on this matter. Caste census will benefit all sections of people.”

Senior Congress leader and member of Bihar legislative council Prem Chandra Mishra believed that there is an internal conflict between JDU and BJP which has led to such a situation.

“On many issues, both JDU and BJP have internal conflict right from population control policy to caste census. They have different views on the same issue. Recently Nityanand Rai had also talked about police modernization. Rai said that Bihar has not used the money released by the centre for police modernisation in the state. Such a statement is the big question on the inefficiency of Nitish Kumar. Whatever they (read BJP and JDU) are doing is complete politics. Somewhere, BJP is trying to prove that Nitish's government is not performing well,” Mishra said.

He further said, “If law and order is not good in Bihar and the fund for police modernization is going unused, it proves that what RJD and Congress have been saying about Bihar government not using budgetary allocation properly is correct.”

Asked about whether the centre will consider Nitish's request, Mishra said, “Why Centre will consider his request, they are doing this with much thought. It is now up to Nitish Kumar ji to clear his position. He must clarify where he stands in NDA or he will keep on issuing statements for the sake of politics. Nitish ji is not comfortable with BJP and keeping their respective constituencies in mind, the NDA leader keeps on giving such statements. I also believe that in the coming days, the conflict between JDU and BJP will increase manifold and the government will not survive.”

Patna based political expert Dr Sanjay Kumar too opined that the centre will not consider his request at any cost.

“Caste census is in the central list and not even in concurrent and state lists. So take my word, the centre will not reconsider this request at all. The first caste census took place in 1931 and after ten years it was supposed to take place in 1941 but at that time the entire energy was focused on the second world war due to which the caste census was not conducted. Again in 1951, it was put on the floor of the house for the discussion but Independent India's first home minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel said that there will be no caste census because it harms the social fabric of the state. He had further said that country would be divided on caste lines resulting in weakening the nation. So since then, nobody dared to speak on this issue.” Dr Sanjay said.

He further said, “However, later many governments supported the issue but caste census never took place. Even the Dr. Manmohan Singh government promised to do so but it never happened apart from the census. Ironically, most of the political parties do get the data of caste census, otherwise how they claim so and so percentage of any caste. However, the only thing is that the data never got published. This means there is no authenticity of the claim made by the political parties and leaders. Nitish ji is just doing his own politics because he also knows very well that nothing can happen. He just wants to send a message to the people that he tried hard.”

Meanwhile, Tejashwi posted a tweet from his official Twitter handle asking Nitish what he will do if the centre will not consider his request?

“Honorable Chief minister ji, what will you do if the central government does not reconsider its decision on caste census. On our request, the proposal of caste census was passed with consensus in both houses. You have a stake in the central government, you have a cabinet minister there despite that you have to do persuasion with them,” Tejashwi said.