NEW DELHI: Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar on Thursday said the Centre’s decision on caste enumeration in the upcoming census exercise is a transformative step to bring about social justice and rejected suggestions that it could lead to problems in the society.
Dhankhar said thoughtfully collected caste data will be an instrument of integration, like an MRI of the body. Speaking to Indian Statistical Service probationers, he said effective policy-making without solid statistical data was akin to performing surgery in the dark. He emphasised that caste enumeration would be a game-changer, helping to promote social justice and offering new insights.
“It will satisfy people’s aspirations. It is a very broad decision of the government,” a statement quoted Dhankhar as saying. The Vice President said that far from being divisive, the data if gathered with care would unify rather than fragment society.
“Some people are debating it. We are mature minds. How can information collected by itself be a source of the problem? It is like getting your body MRI. You will know about it when you stand. People will realise. And this mechanism will transform abstract constitutional commitments to equality into measurable, accountable policy outcomes,” he said.
Affirming that India’s developmental goals hinge on evidence-based planning, Dhankhar noted that the journey towards becoming a developed nation must be marked by statistical insights and milestones grounded in data. “In togetherness, we must create a nation that thinks empirically ... but is driven by hardcore evidence,” he said.
Dhankhar called for the timely and relevant collection and use of data in policy-making, stressing that statistics is about much more than just numbers.