Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw speaks during Cabinet Briefing, at National Media Centre in New Delhi
| Photo Credit:
ANI
The Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday approved a proposal to conduct the Census of India 2027, allocating ₹11,718.24 crore for what will be the world’s largest administrative and statistical exercise.
The Census will be carried out in two phases: Houselisting and Housing Census from April to September 2026, followed by Population Enumeration in February 2027. In Ladakh, and the snow-bound areas of Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, Population Enumeration will be conducted earlier, in September 2026. Nearly 30 lakh field functionaries will be deployed to complete the massive nationwide exercise.
The allocation of ₹11,718.24 crore would be spent to fund the two phases of Census, said Union minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Friday who briefed reporters on the decisions taken by the Cabinet.
The Census 2027 will also capture caste data electronically in the PE phase, Vaishnaw said.
For the first time, India’s Census will be conducted through digital means, with enumerators using mobile applications on both Android and iOS platforms. A central portal will be used for real-time monitoring to ensure improved data quality.
Use of a mobile app for data collection and the central portal for monitoring purposes will ensure better quality data, Vaishnaw said.
Data dissemination will be much better and in a user-friendly way so that all queries on required parameters for policy-making will be available with a click of a button, the Minister elaborated.
The Census-as-a-Service (CaaS) will deliver data to ministries in a clean, machine-readable and actionable format, he said.
A dedicated Census Management & Monitoring System (CMMS) and a new Houselisting Block (HLB) Creator web map tool will support on-ground operations. The public will also be given the option to self-enumerate, marking another significant step in modernising the process. Officials said the entire digital infrastructure will be backed by robust security features.
Awareness campaign
The Census will additionally feature a strong awareness campaign to encourage participation and provide reliable, timely information about the process. The Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs had earlier, on 30 April 2025, approved the inclusion of caste enumeration in the Population Enumeration phase of Census 2027. The exercise will capture caste data electronically for the first time.
Under Census procedures, enumerators—mostly government school teachers appointed by state administrations—will visit every household and canvass separate questionnaires for each phase. Supervisors and other Census officials at sub-district, district and State levels will support the field operations. All Census personnel will receive honorariums for the work, which is conducted in addition to their regular duties.
The government said Census 2027 aims to make data available in the shortest possible time, supported by improved visualisation tools and seamless dissemination down to the village and ward levels.
To execute the digital-heavy exercise, about 18,600 technical personnel will be engaged for around 550 days, generating an estimated 1.02 crore man-days of employment. Officials said this will also enhance local-level capacity in digital data management and monitoring, improving future job prospects for those involved.
Census 2027 will be the 16th Census of India and the eighth since Independence. Conducted under the legal framework of the Census Act, 1948 and Census Rules, 1990, the Census remains the primary source of granular data on housing, amenities, demography, religion, language, education, migration, economic activity, fertility and more, forming the backbone of national policy and planning.
Published on December 12, 2025