Patna, The way has been cleared for counting of castes in Bihar. An all-party meeting chaired by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday agreed on the caste census. The Bharatiya Janata Party has also agreed for the socio-economic census in Bihar. Announcing this after the all-party meeting, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said – first the resolution will be passed in the cabinet, then the counting of castes will start. He had already announced that the Bihar government would conduct the caste census at its own expense.
Keep in mind that before independence, the last caste census was conducted in 1931. For the first time in independent India, the Namboodiripad government of Kerala got the castes counted. Caste survey was conducted in Karnataka in recent days but its report has not been made public yet. However, after the all-party meeting held on Wednesday, Nitish Kumar said – all parties have decided that caste census will be held in Bihar. Financial arrangements have to be made for this also. He said – Advertisement will also be given for conducting caste census. All parties will be informed. Officials will be engaged in this regard. Training will be given to the employees.
The Chief Minister said- We have given its name to caste based census. All the nine parties have decided on it. There is no difference by any means. We had requested the central government on our behalf, but there was no response from there, so we decided to do it ourselves. Significantly, Nitish Kumar had met the Prime Minister with a delegation of leaders of all the parties of Bihar and demanded a caste-based census.
Before the all-party meeting regarding the caste census, BJP leader and Union Minister Giriraj Singh had raised questions on this. Before Wednesday’s meeting, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Vijay Choudhary, while answering their questions, said that all religions are counted in it. Giriraj Singh had also demanded caste census of minorities. However, representatives of BJP, RJD, Congress, CPI, CPM, CPI ML, MIM and HAM attended the all-party meeting, apart from JDU, which is leading the government.
