Arrangements in place for conducting caste census in Kottayam

All arrangements have been put in place to ensure the smooth conduct of the Socio Economic and Caste Census 2011 in the district. The census in the district will commence on Tuesday (April 10) and conclude within May 25. The exercise will be formally launched in the district with the compilation of data from the residence of Revenue Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan near Pallipurathu Kavu.


Speaking to media persons at a press conference on Monday, District Census Officer K.B. Sivadas said that the exercise is aimed at collecting the required details for the formulation of the 12th Five Year Plan and to identify the beneficiaries of the various programmes required for uplifting the downtrodden. The census will be based on the national population register using which an abridged house-list had been prepared during the national population survey that was conducted in the previous year.



Twenty six charge centres have been established in various parts of the district. The data that have been fed into Tablet PCs, the hand-held electronic devices, will be uploaded into the main server at the respective charge centre before 5 p.m. on the daily basis by the data entry operators. The collected data would be submitted to the Union Ministry for Rural Development and the Directorate of Census Operations.


Mr. Sivadas said that an enumeration block would be formed by 100 to 125 houses (approximately 600 to 700 persons). The district will have a total of 4,028 enumeration blocks, of which 3,523 blocks are in the rural areas, 463 blocks in town areas and the remaining in forest areas. In addition to 212 supervisors, as many as 1,172 enumerators and an equal number of data-entry operators will be deployed for the data collection. Each enumerator will be allotted a maximum of four enumeration blocks, he said.


He also pointed out that the census exercise will also involve the collection of data of those who lead a nomadic life.


The census exercise is being led by the Union Ministry for Rural Development, Union Ministry for Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation, Registrar General of India, Bharat Electronics Limited and National Informatics Centre.