The Congress on Monday promised that a government led by it will conduct a nationwide caste census and implement 33 per cent reservation for women in the Lok Sabha and state legislative assemblies at the earliest, including adequate representation for women belonging to the OBC community.
The BJP on Saturday accused the Congress of repeatedly supplying "oxygen" to Pakistan, and slammed the opposition party for its leader Charanjit Singh Channi's remarks questioning the veracity of Balakot air strikes after the 2019 Pulwama terror attack. BJP national spokesperson Sambit Patra alleged that the Congress is full of pro-Pakistan leaders who make statements against India's interests, and mocked the party for its letter that had advised its functionaries to toe the official line on the issue. Patra also criticized other Congress leaders for their comments on the Pulwama and Pahalgam terror attacks, accusing them of lowering the morale of the armed forces. He further slammed the Congress for claiming credit for the government's announcement of the caste census and said the party never carried out the exercise during its over 60-year stint in power.
The Telangana government officials would submit a report by February 2 on the caste survey held in the state last year.
'Mamata needs to address the anger and resentment among various sections of the Hindu community because low-scale communal violence has always paid richer electoral dividends for the BJP.'
According to a parliamentary response by the Union health ministry in 2023, around 654,000 families in Delhi are eligible to enrol under the scheme.
'The COVID-19 threat is still looming large. The census and NPR are not in the priority list of the government as of now'
Whenever the Census operation resumes, it will capture the impact of Covid-19 to a large extent, including the extra-lethal second wave, reports Abhishek Waghmare.
'Is it time to think beyond the traditional questionnaire-based approach in India?' asks Atanu Biswas.
'While suppression of information is acceptable for the government, the Opposition's efforts at pinning the government and its leaders is labeled anti-national,' points out Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
The row over Bharatiya Janata Party MP Anurag Thakur's remarks in Lok Sabha escalated on Wednesday with the Congress submitting a notice to move a privilege motion against Prime Minister Narendra Modi for posting on 'X' a video that allegedly also contained expunged portions of Thakur's speech.
The exercise to update the National Population Register and the first phase of the Census 2021 will not be held as scheduled due to the 21-day lockdown announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, officials said on Tuesday. Both the exercises were supposed to be carried out from April 1 to September 30.
The decision, which comes ahead of the state assembly elections, underscores the cow's spiritual, scientific, and historical significance in Indian society, an official said. It highlights the integral role that cows have played in India's cultural landscape for centuries, he added.
Days after violence erupted over a survey of a Mughal-era mosque in Sambhal, an imam of another mosque was fined Rs 2 lakh for allegedly using a loudspeaker at high volume. The incident occurred in the Anar Wali Masjid, prompting authorities to take action. The imam, identified as Tahzeeb, was fined and granted bail, with orders to refrain from similar conduct for six months. The incident comes amid ongoing tensions in Sambhal following the November 24 violence during a court-ordered survey of the Shahi Jama Masjid, which resulted in four deaths and several injuries. The incident has become a major political controversy, with Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra raising the issue in Parliament.
A fresh survey to identify a minimum of eight million new beneficiaries of the flagship rural housing scheme, in addition to the 12 million already identified, will use the latest face-recognition tools to minimise gaps, a senior official said on Tuesday. The survey, which has already started across the country for building the fresh 20 million new rural houses over the next five years, can also be done by the beneficiary himself/herself as well through the Awaassoft mobile application specially created for this purpose.
'The BJP lacks a credible mass leader who matches Mamata Banerjee's popularity.' 'Given the division of votes among Opposition parties, the West Bengal government's dole-giving strategy, and the consolidation of the poor, significant sections of scheduled caste groups and Muslim minorities behind the ruling party, it will be difficult to dislodge the Trinamool from power.'
The Maharashtra Assembly elections are taking place today, with the ruling BJP-led Mahayuti alliance seeking to retain power and the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) hoping for a comeback. The campaign saw prominent leaders like Narendra Modi, Amit Shah, Rahul Gandhi, and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra crisscrossing the state to garner votes. The Mahayuti is banking on popular schemes while the MVA focuses on issues like caste-based census and social justice. The elections have also seen a significant rise in the number of candidates and voters.
If the DMK is able to sustain the momentum until the assembly polls, the AIADMK especially and the PMK and possibly the infant TVK too would find it hard to sign up with the BJP, explains N Sathiya Moorthy.
Discussions are going on at the highest level of the government and in all probability, the NPR and house listing phase of the Census work will be deferred till the threat of the Coronavirus is over, a home ministry official said.
With the dissolution of former chief statistician Pronab Sen-led Standing Committee on Statistics (SCoS) by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI), the National Statistical Commission (NSC) has regained prominence as the primary statistical body to address issues regarding results, methodology and questionnaire, among others. A MoSPI official in an email informed the 16-member SCoS about the decision to dissolve it, citing that its work was "overlapping" with that of the Steering Committee for National Sample Surveys (NSS), which was set up in June this year.
Non-availability of army personnel due to Indo-Pak tensions has forced authorities to indefinitely postpone Pakistan's census, the first in 17 years, according to a media report on Sunday.
Do we have enough trained oncologists and medical professionals in India to man these over 4,500 beds in the public sector?
A decision on enumeration of transgenders in the second phase of Census 2011 would be taken in consultations with experts, a top official said on Friday.
'The deceased persons might be sitting or lying down when the tragedy struck them in the wee hours of Tuesday'
The NSSO had enumerated 79,306 households in rural areas and 45,374 in urban regions.
If everything goes according to the plan, the exercise will begin after the Lok Sabha elections, the official said.
Rediff.com's Priyanka meets Dr C Chandramouli, the Census Commissioner of India, where he explains what it takes to organise the mammoth exercise.
'It would be reasonable to assume that Modi 3.0 would be more focused on projects and schemes which do not require any legislative change or which have the support of its coalition partners,' asserts A K Bhattacharya.
The CAA was enacted in December 2019 for granting Indian nationality to persecuted non-Muslim migrants from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan who came to India on or before December 31, 2014. These include Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians.
We see them everyday, and almost never spare a second glance. The men, women and children who eat, sleep and wake up on our pavements, under our bridges and on deserted platforms of our railway stations.
In a major policy reversal the US Commerce Department has officially announced that the US Census Bureau would report married same-sex couples in the 2010 census.
With 7 per cent economic growth, India is not creating enough jobs as reflected by the number of applicants for vacant posts in some states, Reserve Bank's former governor Raghuram Rajan said and suggested the government needs to focus on promoting labour-intensive industries to generate employment. Rajan further said some Indians, especially those at upper level, are comfortable and have high incomes, but consumption growth from the lower half of the country has still not recovered to pre-pandemic level.
The bench noted even the high court has said in its judgement that 80 per cent of the work related to the survey has been completed.
The plea filed by Nalanda resident Akhilesh Kumar submitted that in terms of the constitutional mandate, only the Union government is empowered to conduct a census.
Inaugurating the 'Janganana Bhawan', the office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India, Shah said census is a process that may form the basis of development agenda.
The nation's official poverty rate in 2010 was 15.1 per cent, up from 14.3 per cent in 2009.
Estimates say finances to go 268% more than Plan allocation.
The request to contest from the state is being made as people see her as the 'mother' who gave statehood to Telangana, he was quoted as saying in an official release
Nitish Kumar wants to assure the BJP leadership that he will continue to be a part of the NDA. But he also wants to secure a larger number of seats for his party in the 2025 assembly elections in Bihar.
When asked about the Uniform Civil Code, Gandhi said he would comment on it only after he knows what is BJP's proposal.
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