AA Edit | RSS backing caste census spells a problem for BJP

The cautious clearance that the BJP’s ideological mentor, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), has given to the idea of conducting a caste-based census nevertheless puts it in a serious dilemma. It is one which the saffron party can resolve only by effectuating a tectonic shift in its ideological positioning.

Despite consistent opposition to the idea by the BJP, voiced by its senior leaders including Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath, the RSS, after a just-concluded brainstorming session in Kerala, greenlighted the idea. But it laid down a condition: Governments need data to address the needs of a specific community or caste, but the exercise should be conducted “very seriously, not on the basis of electioneering or election practices or politics”.

While the self-proclaimed cultural organisation cannot be faulted for its apparently apolitical stand even if on a quintessentially political issue, the BJP would find the exercise too complicated.

Interestingly, the demand for a caste-based survey which will in effect demonstrate who owns what and how much was first mooted by parties belonging to the socialist family. These include the Samajwadi Party, the Janata Dal (United) and the Rashtriya Janata Dal. The Congress Party, realising its electoral potential, then took it up and in so serious a manner that it became the favourite theme of speeches party leader Rahul Gandhi delivered across the country during his campaign for the 2024 Lok Sabha election. The idea was also given pride of place in the party’s manifesto.

The Left parties, too, have long supported the idea and even the Dravidian parties have been vocal about it.

But now that the Sangh Parivar’s chief patron, too, has also endorsed it, the polity faces a piquant situation in which the ruling BJP has been left holding the baby of the Opposition.

Caste has been one of the major differentiators in Indian social life and the very idea of reservation for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes was introduced in the Constitution as a means to ensure adequate participation of people historically denied their rightful share in the resources of society. While SCs and STs were given reservation from the beginning, the OBCs had to wait for another four decades.

A caste-based survey and the allocation of resources based on the data emanating from it would be one of the best tools for India to ensure inclusive growth. But the idea would run contrary to the Hindutva ideology.

A caste-based survey would expose the injustices perpetrated by dominant but demographically small sections of society. The party can ill-afford reverses in its social engineering projects.

But more importantly, the party then runs the risk of facing a rejuvenated Congress and the INDIA bloc in the coming elections where they can make a legitimate claim over one of the most revolutionary ideas that can potentially decide how this country should be governed. It is up to the BJP leadership now to negotiate this tricky circumstance.