State kick-starts Census ops sans NPR

Responsibilities being assigned to various govt. officials

After dropping the references to National Population Register (NPR) from its communication, the Directorate of Census Operations, Kerala, has started assigning responsibilities of national Census operations to various government officials.

While the Tahasildars will coordinate and monitor the operations related to Census of India 2021 in the rural areas, the secretaries of Corporations and municipalities will take care of the activities in the urban areas.

“The field operations for the first phase of Census 2021 will be conducted during April-May 2020 throughout Kerala,” said a communication sent out by T. Mitra, Director of Census Operations, Kerala, on January 24.

The obliteration of the references to the updation of the register from its communication is seen as a marked deviation from the procedure followed by the directorate till recently. The removal of the references to the updation of the register was construed as an indication of dropping the process in the State.

There has not been any official word about the deletion of the reference to NPR.

Updation of register

Interestingly, the directorate, in a communication send out on January 14, had mentioned that the updation of the population register will be carried out along with the Houselisting and Housing Census in the State. The Census and the updation of the register was to be held in the State from April 15 to May 29.

The proposal to update the document had kicked up a socio-political storm in the State. The State government had decided to dissociate with the process following the widespread apprehensions that it would lead to the preparation of the National Register of Citizens.

The Hindu had on Thursday reported that the directorate had dropped all the references to the controversial process of updation of NPR from its communication and restricted itself to the Census operations in its official messages.

Training programme

The Census authorities may shortly restructure the five-day training programme for the field officers after dropping out the NPR component. The original scheme was to reserve a day in the five-day training module for NPR. The official communication in this regard is expected shortly, sources indicated.

Meanwhile, the District Collectors have written to all the tahasildars and the secretaries of the Corporations and municipalities “not to mention NPR operations while sending out communications connected with Census Operations-2021” as all the “activities connected with the NPR operations in the State proposed to be conducted along wit the first phase of the Census operations 2021 have been stayed.”

The Collectors also requested the officials to “personally ensure the directives are obeyed failing which disciplinary action shall be initiated against the delinquent officers.”