It is an open secret that the ruling YSRCP in Andhra Pradesh is going all out to woo the Backward Class (BC) communities ahead of the 2024 elections. The party has now made a fresh pitch for a caste-based census in the country.
At an all-party meeting held ahead of the Budget session of Parliament, YSRC parliamentary party leader V Vijay Sai Reddy on Monday, 30 January, once again reiterated the demand for a caste-based enumeration.
“Even though the Backward Classes constitute half of our population, we still do not have updated data on their population and socio-economic state,” Vijay Sai Reddy told the meeting.
“The caste-wise enumeration of backward classes in the upcoming decennial census is necessary to formulate scientific policies for their welfare. I hope this issue will be given due importance,” he added.
In January 2021, the state Assembly passed a resolution, calling for a nationwide caste-wise census. The resolution was forwarded to the Centre.
Related: YSRCP makes moves to consolidate Backward Class support
Major vote bank
The BCs, which include around 143 different caste groups, comprise around 37 percent of the state’s population of approximately 4.98 crore.
The rival political parties know that the BCs could influence the election outcome, and they are pulling out all stops to consolidate their respective vote banks and further expand their base among the communities.
A majority of the 143 caste groups were traditionally aligned with the TDP, ever since NT Rama Rao founded the party in 1982.
Shift in BC votes
However, the 2019 poll outcome revealed that YS Jagan Mohan Reddy-led YSRCP had breached the TDP base and secured the support of the BCs. And YSRCP intensified its efforts to further consolidate its BC vote bank in the event of a TDP-Jana Sena alliance in the 2024 polls.
The YSRCP has 151 seats in the 175-member Andhra Pradesh Assembly.
After assuming power, Jagan constituted around 56 corporations for different BCs and installed party loyalists as their chairpersons and members.
The setting up of more than 50 corporations has been seen as an attempt to create “opinion makers” among the backward groups, and help them assert their caste identity.
The TDP has often criticised these corporations, terming them “ornamental”, meant to deceive the backward classes. The real power, the Opposition party, said, rested with the powerful Reddys in the YSRCP.
The ruling party, however, has a different take. “Enumeration of backward classes will help devise better policies for their welfare, education, employment, and for effective implementation to benefit BCs,” Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy told the Assembly in 2021.
“A caste-based census in India was last conducted in 1931 and even after 90 years, due to the absence of a proper enumeration, there is no scientific data regarding the population of BCs to ascertain their social, educational, and economic backwardness. This has been posing a hurdle to meet the interests and aspirations of the BCs,” he said while participating in a discussion on the resolution for the caste-based census.
Related: Jagan caught between Kapus, OBCs as Centre puts quota onus on state
Toe Bihar line
Merely passing resolutions or making demands will not help the BCs, the community leaders opined.
They wanted YS Jagan Mohan Reddy to toe the line of Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, who launched a statewide caste-based census initiative.
“Let the Jagan government follow Bihar where a caste-based census has been launched. It should not be a problem for the Andhra Pradesh government to take up the census,” Guduru Venkateswara Rao, president of All India BC Praja Welfare Association, told South First.
“Such a caste-wise census in the state will help the government to make changes, if necessary, to the state list and provide local reservations, instead of waiting for the Centre,” he added.
The Jagan Cabinet comprises 11 ministers from backward classes. Seven out of the 13 mayors, six of the 13 zilla panchayat chairpersons, 76 of the 196 market committee chairpersons, 201 of 484 nominated directors, and 53 of the 137 corporation chairpersons are BCs.
