BHUBANESWAR: With preparations underway for the 2021 Census, the largest administrative exercise of the world, specially-designed mobile app will be used for the first time by enumerators to collect household data.
Household data is proposed to be collected through a mobile app and enumerators will be encouraged to use their own mobile phones, said official sources. The issue was recently discussed at a high-level meeting here under the chairmanship of Chief Secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi who emphasised on complete coverage of all houses and accurate enumeration of all people.
“It was decided in the meeting that this time, one specially-designed mobile app will be adopted for enumeration to make it more accurate and real time. Tehsildars were asked to update and certify the maps of villages in their respective areas,” sources said.
District Collectors will function as principal census officers. Similarly, Additional District Magistrates will be designated as census officer in respective districts.
The Census would be carried on in two phases. In the first phase, there would be house listing and housing census. In the second, there would be population enumeration.
It was decided to complete both the phases tentatively by March 2021. Tehsil-wise enumeration would be done this time instead of police station-wise enumeration.
According to the Revenue department, pre-testing activities of the census techniques will be piloted in three places - Pattamundai in Kendrapara district, Puintala in Balangir and Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation.
Joint Director of Census Pravakar Barad said the pre-testing will be done through the mobile app. It will start from August 12, 2019 and will be completed by September 30, 2019. The whole census operation will be done on sampling basis using both the mobile app and paper mode this time.
Development Commissioner Asit Kumar Tripathy, Principal Secretaries Nikunja Bihari Dhal, Bishnupada Sethi, G Mathivathanan and State nodal officer Sailendra Dwibedi participated in the deliberations.