Caste census: Congress steps up efforts to own narrative, deny political mileage to BJP

With Prime Minister Narendra Modi caving into its long-standing demand for conducting a caste census, the Congress party now wants to ensure that the BJP doesn’t walk away with the potential political benefits of the Centre’s decision.

The Congress party, sources say, wants to aggressively “expose the BJP’s hypocrisy” on the issue while projecting Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi as the “real force” that brought an otherwise unyielding Modi regime to heel on the matter.

Also read: Announce 'clear timeline' for every stage of caste survey: CWC to Centre

The Centre is yet to divulge details on when the census would be conducted and the methodology enumerators would adopt for caste enumeration. The Congress leadership believes the party must “begin now to push the gauntlet further” about steps that must be taken by the Modi government once the exercise concludes.

Owning narrative

“We have to own the narrative on caste census. The public already knows that the BJP was never in favour (of caste enumeration) and it was Rahul Gandhi and the Congress that strongly pushed for it for the last 11 years but this should not make us complacent… the BJP will, of course, try to sell this as another historic decision taken by Modi and we have to counter that campaign aggressively and remind the people that it was Rahul Gandhi who told Modi in Lok Sabha that ‘we will make you do it and if you don’t then we will do it when we come to power’,” a senior Congress leader told The Federal.

Rahul, who has been asserting that a caste census is only a “first step towards a new paradigm of development”, has already stepped up pressure on the Centre to disclose a definite timeline for implementing its decision. The former Congress president has also demanded that the government take steps to break the Supreme Court-mandated ceiling of 50 per cent on caste-based reservations and also allow reservations in private education institutions as outlined under Article 15 (5) of the Constitution.

CWC backs Rahul

Rahul’s demands were expectedly backed by the Congress Working Committee (CWC), on May 2, through a resolution that also called for an “immediate debate” in Parliament on all issues linked with the caste census. These demands, party leaders feel, will allow the Congress and other votaries of caste enumeration in the wider INDIA bloc to “shape and direct the political narrative” on caste census and blunt the BJP’s ongoing efforts to solely credit Modi for the decision.

A day after the CWC meeting, Congress’s general secretary (organisation) KC Venugopal issued an office circular instructing functionaries across the party’s state and district units to “organise chaupal meetings with active participation from social activists, civil society activists, teachers, lawyers, shopkeepers, SHG (self-help group) members, and Bahujan communities” and “disseminate the Congress party’s historical and ongoing commitments at the grass root level, including the leadership role played by Rahul Gandhi” in pressuring the Centre to allow caste enumeration in the upcoming census.

Exposing BJP

The circular has also instructed party functionaries to “vocally and visibly” raise the demands made by the CWC from the Centre regarding the next steps on caste enumeration during the Samvidhaan Bachao rallies that the Congress is currently organising across the country. The Congress’s state and district leadership has also been told to “expose the BJP’s anti-Bahujan ideology, its resistance to caste enumeration, and its efforts to suppress social justice”.

Also read: Robbed of Caste Census pitch, Congress, allies must now reinvent campaign

Similarly, social media cells of the AICC and state units have also been told to flood platforms like X, Instagram and Whatsapp with content hailing the “leadership role of Rahul Gandhi and the CWC resolution” on the caste census while exposing the “BJP’s record of caste denial and anti-Bahujan actions”.

Calling the shots

The Grand Old Party also wants to strongly push the “sarkar tumhari, system humara” (your government, our system) slogan to assert how “Rahul has repeatedly forced Modi to make a U-turn on key issues of legislation and policy”.

Since the CCPA’s nod for caste enumeration sundry Congress leaders, party president Mallikarjun Kharge, communications department chief Jairam Ramesh and CWC member Sachin Pilot have been trying to remind the public how the Modi government was forced to withdraw amendments proposed to the UPA-era Land Acquisition Bill, repeal the three controversial farm laws and now give in to the demand for a caste census following the unwavering stand taken by Rahul on each of these issues.

Telangana model

The Congress, sources told The Federal, will also aggressively promote the “Telangana model” as the “best template” that the Centre can follow for caste enumeration.

It may be recalled that soon after the Centre’s Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs (CCPA) gave its nod, on April 30, for caste enumeration in the upcoming Census, Rahul had said that the model of public consultations followed by the Congress’s Telangana government for giving shape to a caste survey in the state was better than the “bureaucratic model” adopted by Bihar, where a caste survey was concluded in October 2023.

The Congress was a junior partner in the Bihar government when it commissioned and concluded a caste survey of the state. Rahul, however, has been stridently running down the initiative and asserting that benefits that should have accrued to backward castes, scheduled castes and scheduled tribes following the publication of the survey haven’t materialised yet.

Pasmanda Muslims

Amid rumours that the BJP also wants to use the caste census to reach out to Pasmanda Muslims – estimated by some to constitute over 80 per cent of India’s Muslim population – by categorising them as backward castes and thereby making them eligible for quota benefits, Congress sources say the party also wants to “blunt any such campaign by the BJP before it gains traction”. To this effect, the Congress plans to highlight the BJP’s strong opposition to “every effort made by the Congress in the past to give backward Muslims benefits of affirmative action”.

Former MP Ali Anwar Ansari, founder of the Pasmanda Muslim Mahaz, told The Federal, “The BJP has been the biggest opponent of reservations for Muslims and this rumour that it now wants Pasmanda Muslims officially categorised as backward caste in the caste census is as misleading as it is mischievous”.

Also read: As Centre prepares to embark on national caste census, here's how Telangana did it

A former JD (U) leader who joined the Congress recently, Ansari said, “Whenever the Congress or any other Opposition party has tried to give the benefit of affirmative action to Pasmanda Muslims, already recognised in many states, including Bihar, as backward castes, the BJP had protested saying the Constitution doesn’t allow religion-based reservation even though such reservation was not being proposed due to religion but because these Muslims are from backward castes… it is Rahul Gandhi who has been strongly pushing for giving Pasmanda Muslims the reservation they are constitutionally entitled to because of being backward and we will go to Pasmanda Muslims and make them aware of it.”