Opinion
A national caste census looks all but inevitable
Summary
Identity politics is a reality, the ‘average’ Indian would identify as OBC and our democracy’s dynamics favour a caste headcount beyond Bihar. But any quota rejig will need deep debate
The term ‘historic’ may have lost its punch from overuse, but Bihar’s caste count will qualify if it revives the Mandal movement in Indian politics and forces a quota policy rejig. The chances of both rose on 2 October. Patna made public the findings of a state-level survey, India’s first enumeration by caste since a census done back in 1931. Reviled for hard-coding such identities, that Raj-era practice was dumped. Alas, identity politics has proven inescapable. The dominant player in our political arena, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has counted on Hindu consolidation as part of its electoral game-plan all along, but it got its heft under Narendra Modi’s leadership from a vote swing among Other Backward Classes (OBCs), who probably form the majority of our citizens. The BJP’s 2024 challenger for power, an alliance called INDIA, seems bent on making caste injustice a big plank in a campaign aimed broadly at the same modal chunk of the electorate. With our democracy’s dynamics shaped by shifts in OBC support and a popular appetite for data whetted by hot news of Bihar’s caste break-up, an all-India caste census looks all but inevitable now. For all the unease this proposal causes, even the BJP may find that the idea cannot be corked back in.
Advocates of a caste census argue that if the country accepts a triad of basic points—that the links of caste with life outcomes go beyond mere correlation, a hierarchy based on the concept has existed for centuries, and job/student reservations are a valid tool of upliftment—then affirmative action by the Indian state requires an updated dashboard of data on all who would qualify for it, instead of relying on wild guesses drawn from dodgy old numbers. The attention grabber of Monday’s release was that about 84.5% of Bihar’s nearly 131 million people are classified as Extremely Backward, Backward, Scheduled Caste and Tribe (SC and ST), with only 15.5% in the general category. No doubt, any such survey is open to epistemic criticism. As caste has no bio-marker, what folks claim can be contested, especially if there’s scope for choice. As critics have noted, while most of Bihar’s Muslim minority identify as Backward, over a third are classified in the general category that’s two-thirds Hindu upper-caste (who add up to around a tenth of the total, with Brahmins under 4%). If fluid identities are at play, can such a survey reliably guide public policy?
The answer depends on what changes are pushed for. Although Bihar’s break-up is not representative of the whole country, it spotlights a long-glaring discrepancy. The 27% seats kept aside for OBCs by the central quota regime are far fewer in proportion to actual OBC numbers than those reserved for others; going by numerical strength, SCs with 15%, STs with 7.5% and Economically Weaker Sections with a 10% quota have much better carve-outs. A low OBC award was the result of the Supreme Court’s 50% cap on reserved seats. Today, the Congress party not only wants this limit axed, its recently adopted slogan, “Jitni abaadi, utna haq," while easy to misread as a scandalously majoritarian call against equal rights, is actually a call for a re-split of the quota pie to reflect India’s caste composition. As every second voter (at least) would be a beneficiary, this is not a debate any OBC-wooing party can risk ducking. Of course, anxiety among upper-castes mustn’t be overlooked. If mass discontent over lack of diversity is ever to be resolved, though, a proportional slice-up may be the only consensus option.
