Bihar caste-based census gets cabinet nod, to be completed by February 2023

The Bihar government will spend ₹500 crore from its contingency fund. This comes a day after chief minister Nitish Kumar said that a caste-based count will be conducted in a set times frame.

The caste-census in Bihar will be completed by February 2023, the cabinet decided on Thursday.

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar had said that the caste-based count will be conducted in a set time frame.  (HT Photo)

“The survey shall be completed by February 23 next year. Work will start no sooner than the notification is issued by the general administration department,” Chief Secretary Amir Subhani said.

The Bihar government will spend ₹500 crore from its contingency fund. This comes a day after chief minister Nitish Kumar said that a caste-based count will be conducted in a set time frame. His statement came after an all-party meeting in Patna on Wednesday

The caste-based census has been a major issue in Bihar's politics. RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav, who has been demanding the caste-based census to be conducted, had termed it a victory. ""After public pressure and a long struggle by ideological parties in favour of it, it was unanimously decided in the meeting yesterday that soon it will be approved to conduct a caste census of all religions within the stipulated time frame," the Bihar leader of opposition has tweeted.

Both the JD(U) and RJD have been quite vocal in their demand for the caste census for years. The Congress-led UPA government at the Centre had agreed to the demand for a caste-census at a national level in 2010. But the data collected during the last census was never processed.

But the demand for a caste-census has created sharp divisions between the ruling allies JD(U) and the BJP. Nitish Kumar's party and Jitan Ram Manjhi's HAM-S have accused the saffron party of stalling the move.