India gets ready for world's biggest population count

India, the world's most populous nation, will spend a year conducting its much-delayed population census, after a delay of six years caused by hurdles created in part by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The once-in-a-decade population survey, originally due in 2021, started on Wednesday (April 1) with a short window for citizens who wish to register themselves online, according to the government.

More than 3 million officials will be involved in the mammoth task - conducted in 36 states and federal territories, 7,092 sub-districts, 5,128 statutory towns, 4,580 census towns, and around 639,902 villages, according to previous census data.

There will be two phases of physical door-to-door surveys. The first will list houses and housing conditions, the second - inhabitants and their economic and social parameters, a census official said.

With a population of more than 1.4 billion people, India overtook China in 2023, according to the United Nations Population Fund.

Analysts and economists do not see the size of India's population as a cause for alarm. The government has long hailed its predominantly young population as an opportunity to create a large pool of skilled workers while many major economies struggle with declining and ageing workforces.

Accurate census data is crucial for effective policy making in India, particularly for infrastructure planning, said economist and founder of Research Group Nikore Associates, Mitali Nikore.

“It's very important that we start to invest in the right locations, the right places within the city, within rural urban differences,” she said.

The census will also collect details of castes, the government said. The rigid social stratification system dates back thousands of years and pervades Indian life and politics.

There are scores of caste-based political parties, and many state institutions must offer affirmative action quotas to the so-called lower castes for employment and college places.

India recorded its castes in 2011 for the first time in 80 years, but the data was not fully publicised amid concerns about its accuracy.

The census is expected to conclude next March. Narayan said several data sets from the census, being recorded digitally for the first time, would be released soon after.

-Vishnurupa Parayath, Shubh Mathur, Sunil Silelan, Rishabh, Bhushan Kumar, Tarun Kumar, Sunil Kataria/Reuters