Census may have to wait until next year or even 2022 | Economic Times

NEW DELHI: With the home ministry’s notifications outlining September 30, 2020 as end-date for the first phase of Census as well as National Population Register (NPR) updation exercise to be allowed to lapse, indications are emerging that the onset of Census exercise may have to wait until next year or even 2022 if the Covid-19 situation continues to be concern.Sources in the government said the January 2020 notification indicating April 1 to September 30, 2020 as the timeline for Census Housing and Houselisting operations, will simply be allowed to lapse on Wednesday, with informal discussions with the law ministry indicating that there is no requirement to issue a fresh notification with the new intended timeline. Even the July 31, 2019, notification declaring the government’s intent to update NPR between April 1 and September 30, 2020, in all states/UTs except Assam, will lapse simultaneously. In March 2020, days after imposition of lockdown on account of Covid-19, the home ministry had announced postponement of first phase of Census 2021 and NPR updation “until further orders”.“The Covid-19 situation in the coming months cannot be predicted at this juncture. Given that the Centre and states’ priority right now is tackling the pandemic and its impact, the states are in no mood for even discussions on the way forward on Census/NPR. In any case, Census is not an essential exercise and can wait,” said an official.As per sources, unlike many countries where the law specifically dictates the timing and frequency of Census, the law in India does not mandate repeating the Census exercise every 10 years. “Holding it on a decennial basis is a convention and not a requirement under the law. So there is no legal impediment to postponement of the census exercise,” said a government functionary.While the Census reference date as notified on March 26, 2019 still remains March 1, 2021, the Centre, in an indication that this may no longer be possible, has already written to states a couple of months back, allowing them to make jurisdictional changes till December 31, 2020 — something usually frozen a year in advance. States were earlier asked to freeze jurisdictional changes – such as creation of new districts – on December 31, 2019, but in view of deferring of Census houselisting operations due to Covid-19, some states had requested RGI office to allow them to make these changes. RGI Office wrote to the states 1-2 months ago, extending the timeline to December 31, 2020.As per the home ministry notification dated March 28, 2019 declaring the government’s intent to conduct Census 2021, the houselisting phase was to take place from April 1 to September 30, 2020, with the reference date being March 1, 2021. Population enumeration was to be done from February 9 to 28, 2021.