BENGALURU: The Karnataka State Backward Classes Commission will begin the social and educational survey of backward classes from Saturday. Electricity meter readers will undertake the geo-tagging of all houses across the state. Panel chairman Madhusudhan R Naik appealed to citizens to cooperate so that no house is missed and the survey can be completed successfully within the stipulated 90 days.
The chairman explained that the first phase of the survey will focus on preparing a house list and mapping households, an essential preliminary step. This will enable complete enumeration, serial numbering, and mapping of all households. As every house in Karnataka is connected to electricity, no household will be left out. Houses will be identified using their electricity revenue registration numbers, and people living there will be surveyed.
This process will set the stage for a systematic and scientific second phase of the survey, scheduled during the Dasara holidays from September 22 to October 7. The school vacation period will facilitate smooth implementation, added Naik.
A special app has been developed by the e-governance and Energy Departments, in collaboration with the commission’s advisory team and Directorate of Electronic Delivery of Citizen Services (EDCS), to support this work. Karnataka, being the first state to achieve complete household electrification, will deploy thousands of ESCOM meter readers for this task. In addition to their routine work of billing, they will now geo-tag each household and include it in the survey, stated Naik, adding that the data collected by meter readers will be uploaded to EDCS servers.
After validation, each household will be mapped and given a unique identification number. This includes apartments and cluster dwellings. Stickers will be affixed to each house to help surveyors identify them during the second phase.