Casting about

The meeting of the Group of Ministers on Thursday on how to carry out a caste headcount in the 2011 Census was predictably inconclusive. In fact,as this newspaper reported,there were differences amongst ministers even on the question of including caste in the Census,with Defence Minister A.K. Antony fearing that it could impede the transition towards a casteless society. Of course,his colleagues noted that the prime minister had already committed to the measure. In the end,the GoM mandated Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee to get views from all political parties,in the hope of reaching a consensus in about four weeks.

The decision to put the debate out for wider consultations is healthy. There was a consensus of sorts in Parliament when the government acceded to the oppositions demand for a caste count. Advocates of the count agree on two things: that the eventual goal is to remove the overlap of caste and disadvantage,and that demographic data about different castes would assist in better targeting welfare and affirmative action programmes.

The trouble is,the last time caste was included in the census,in 1931,does not provide a neat template. The state decidedly cannot go about placing caste in a hierarchy; indeed,it is not strictly caste thats being sought to be measured,as the Constitution mentions other backward classes,and the OBC list is not static,with groups being added and deleted. So even if the state imposes questions of caste identity in the Census,it will have to be done in a more progressive,forward-looking way than was done by the censuses of colonial times. This cannot be a sociological exercise aimed at classifying all Indians; if it is can be truly a way of actualising equality,it is right that the debate is being thrown open.