New Delhi: The Union Cabinet on Monday approved a budgetary allocation of Rs 11,718.24 crore for conducting Census 2027. These announcement done by Raillway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw.
Addressing media after the Cabinet meeting, Vaishnaw said, “A budget of Rs 11,718.24 crore has been approved for Census 2027, which is the largest administrative and statistical exercise in the world.” Census 2027 will be the eighth since Independence and the 16th Census in the world, he added.
Two-Phase Exercise
The Union Minister said that the Census will be conducted in two phases.
The first phase, house listing and housing census, will be conducted between April and September.
The second phase, population enumeration, will be held in February 2027. In snow-bound and non-synchronous regions of Ladakh, Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, the population enumeration will be held in September, 2026.
First Digital Census In India
“This is the first Census by digital means in the country. Data will be collected using mobile applications that will be available for both Android as well as iOS versions. A dedicated portal namely Census Management & Monitoring System (CMMS) has been developed for managing and monitoring the entire exercise on a real-time basis. The House Listing Block (HLB) creator web map application, another innovation for Census 2027, will be used by the charge officers, said Vaishnaw.
Highlighting the implementation strategy for the exercise, Vaishnaw said around 30 lakh field functionaries will complete this gigantic exercise using mobile app for data collection while a central dedicated portal will oversee the exercise, enabling real-time monitoring and quality checks. The Census-as-a-service (CaaS) will deliver data to Ministries in a clean, machine-readable and actionable format.
The Census involves visiting each and every household and canvassing separate questionnaire for house listing and housing census and population enumeration. The enumerators, generally government teachers, will be doing the field work in addition to their regular duties. Other Census functionaries at sub-district, district and state levels will also be appointed by the state/district administration.
An option to self-enumerate will be provided to the public and suitable security features have been provisioned for this mammoth digital operation. Census 2027 will have a focused and wider publicity campaign for nationwide awareness, inclusive participation, last-mile engagement and support for field operations.
The Census is expected to generate around 1.02 crore man-days with 18,600 technical manpower being engaged for about 550 days at the local levels.
Earlier, the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs, in its meeting on April 30, decided to include caste enumeration in the upcoming Census. With the huge social and demographic diversity in our country and related challenges, Census 2027 will capture caste data electronically during population enumeration.
