Census, NPR Updation Likely To Be Delayed By A Year Due To COVID-19 Pandemic: Reports

Indian census, one of the largest administrative exercises in the country, acts as a single source of statistical information on people of India.

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Witnessing the continuous spike in the cases of Coronavirus across the country, the central government is likely to prioritise handling the COVID-19 situation first and delay the first phase of the Census and the exercise to update the National Population Register (NPR) by a year.

As quoted in a report of news agency PTI, a senior official aware of the inside developments stated that "Census is not an essential exercise for now. Even if it is delayed by a year, there would be no harm."

It is to be noted that the Indian census is one of the largest administrative and statistical exercises in the world which brings out a veritable wealth of information on the demographics of the country every 10 years. It act as a single source of statistical information on people of India which helps the State to chalk out various policies. The entire exercise demands he involvement of more than 30 lakh officials who are responsible of visiting each household across the country to collect the data.

The first phase of Indian census and the exercise to update the NPR were reportedly scheduled for this year from April 1 to September 30, 2020. Before the outbreak of the deadly disease in March in India, the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India was all set for the first phase of the census and updation of the NPR , but got deferred due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

The officials stated that since the entire survey involves lakhs of officials to visit each family, it would be a massive health risk to conduct the exercise at such a point.

Meanwhile, India's COVID-19 case tally crossed 35 lakh mark with a spike of 78,761 new cases and 948 deaths in the last 24 hours. The total active cases in the country is 7,65,302. While more than 27,13,934 people have been cured and discharged from the hospitals post recovery,  63,498 COVID-19 patients have lost lives due to the deadly disease.

India recovery rate stands at 76.74 percent while the fatality rate has fallen to 1.81 per cent . Till now 26 lakh people have recuperated from COVID-19.