Caste census crucial to ensure participation of all in govt: Rahul in MP
Rahul Gandhi, senior Congress leader, has called for a caste census to ensure representation of OBCs, dalits, and tribals in the government. He accused the BJP of opposing the census. Gandhi also attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his contradictory statements on the issue. The Congress has included the caste census as a promise in its poll manifesto for the upcoming assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh.
Bhopal: Caste census is necessary to ensure participation of other backward classes (OBC), dalits and tribals in government as per their proportion in population, senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh on Thursday, and accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of opposing the caste-based enumeration exercise.

The former Congress president, who was addressing a rally at Ashok Nagar in Madhya Pradesh, which will go to assembly polls on November 17, said his party has included caste census as one of its promises in its poll manifesto. He also attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the issue, accusing him of speaking in different tones on the subject.
“Prime Minister Narendra Modi calls himself an OBC, but when it comes to caste census he says there is only one caste in India and that is the poor,” Gandhi said, referring to Modi’s speech in poll-bound Chhattisgarh last week.
Noting that most of the unemployed youngsters were from dalit, OBC and tribal communities, the Congress leader added: “If there are 50% OBCs in the country then to run the government, their share in the government should be the same.”
Making a pitch for his party ahead in the run-up to the crucial polls, Gandhi said the Congress will make farmers, labourers and small shopkeepers the foundation of Madhya Pradesh and announced that his party will waive off loans of 2.7 million farmers in the state, if voted to power.
Gandhi said during his Bharat Jodo Yatra last year, people made him believe that India needed a caste census, which would be an X-ray of the country.
“When a person gets injured, we take him for an X-ray to find out if he has suffered a bone fracture or not. In the same way, I call the caste census an X-ray. It will reveal the proportion of OBCs. Dalits and tribals in the population and ensure their participation in government,” he said.
The Modi government’s steps to promote disinvestment and privatisation of public sector firms have resulted in OBCs, dalits and tribals being left out of government recruitment, Gandhi alleged. He added that Goods and Services Tax (GST) was being collected from “these poor sections of society” and that amount was being used to give “huge loans to big industrialists”.
Gandhi’s sister and Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who addressed a poll rally in Chitrakoot assembly constituency in Satna district, reminded the voters of Ramayana’s tradition of “victory of truth and defeat of untruth”.
“On TV, you watch that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan have done a lot of work for the progress of the country and the state, but is this progress reflected on the ground? When you see that you are plagued by problems and there is no hearing, reduce your respect for leaders who lure you and ask you for votes in the name of religion,” she said.
The BJP state unit hit back at the Gandhi siblings, saying they have come for political tourism and that the Congress leaders have no vision for Madhya Pradesh and the country.
“People have seen them during the 15 months rule of the Congress, when there was loot and corruption all around… people felt betrayed after the Congress made lofty promises. There is no future for the Congress in MP,” BJP spokesperson Hitesh Vajpayee said.