Internal reservation: Survey to map SCs and their socio-economic and education levels in Karnataka to begin today

Former judge H.N. Nagamohan Das submitting the report on internal reservations to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah this March.

In an exercise that will map the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and their socio-economic and educational levels in Karnataka, around 60,000 enumerators will ‘knock on every door’ and gather details on a mobile application starting Monday till May 17.

The caste census, conducted in 2015, has pegged the total SC population in Karnataka to be 1.09 crore or about 18.2% of the total population. The survey to identify SC households and their sub-castes is part of the work of the commission headed by retired judge H.N. Nagamohan Das that has been asked by the government to recommend internal reservation among these communities.

Each field-level enumerator will cover about 130 houses during the 13-day survey. They will visit every door in the units mapped and assigned to them and collect information on a mobile application that has been specifically designed for the survey.

“The survey will be conducted between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. and the mobile application will be automatically locked after that to avoid any foul play,” Mr. Das told The Hindu on Sunday.

“We have instructed the enumerators to knock on every door and click the photograph of the person who shares the information and also take a signature. The data collected will be connected to a central server and will be securely coded. We have deployed 6,000 panchayat development officials (PDOs) as supervisors, who will conduct random inspections of households to verify and confirm the visit,” he said.

War room monitoring

Mr. Das said the survey will be monitored through a central war room. The war room will also provide support to enumerators on the field if they encounter any problems while conducting the survey. An exclusive helpline has been set up and email support will also be provided, if required. School teachers and anganwadi workers, who are being deployed as enumerators for the survey, have been trained adequately.

“A handbook on how to conduct the survey and use the mobile application has been provided to the field-level enumerators. However, instant support is provided if they get any doubts or encounter problems on the field,” he explained.

While training for State-level master trainers at the district and taluk level has been provided, training is on for the last three days for the field-level enumerators and supervisors.

The questionnaire on the mobile application has columns to enter case, sub-caste, relationship of the family members, profession, educational status, employment details and all other related aspects. Enumerators have also been trained to verify the caste declaration made by a person by correlating it either by entering the caste certificate, ration card, Aadhar card or voter identity card numbers. 

Asserting that this is to prevent fake entries, Mr. Das said: “The mobile application has been designed in a manner that will show up all details of the person just by entering the numbers of one of these documents. This is possible as the documents would have been linked to get the benefits of the government’s guarantee schemes.”

Following the door-to-door visit, a three day camp will be held from May 19 to 21 in panchayat offices, schools or any other public offices in the area where people, who have missed the door-to-door enumeration, can go and declare their caste status. Besides, an option has also been created to declare caste details online. This window will be open from May 19 to May 23.

“This is to ensure all are covered. The process of online entry will be provided on May 19 to avoid any duplicate entries,” Mr. Das added.

Report to be submitted without any delay

Retired High Court judge H.N. Nagamohan Das said there will be no delay in analysing the survey and submitting the report to the government.

“As all entries will be in the digital format, we will compile and analyse it immediately. We are taking help from IT experts too and the report will be finalised on a war footing approach and submitted to the government,” he added.