Patna High Court Puts Stay on Caste-Census in Bihar

Patna: Patna High Court put a stay on the caste-based census in Bihar on Thursday.

Lawyers of the petitioners had earlier pointed out that the Bihar government has no legal power to conduct caste census as such census should be only be carried out by the Centre.

The caste-based census taken up by the Nitish Kumar government started in Bihar on January 7 at an estimated expenditure of Rs 500 crore. This caste-based census was to be conducted in two stages.

Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai, a BJP MP from Bihar, said in Parliament in 2021 that no caste-based census except for the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and the Scheduled Tribes (STs) would be conducted. Since Independence, the Centre has so far conducted seven censuses and published data related to only SCs and STs.

The opposition BJP in Bihar also opposed the caste-based census in the state.