Bihar Caste-Primarily based Survey, NDTV Explains:
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has known as an all-party meet to debate the caste report (File).
New Delhi:
The Bihar authorities on Monday launched information from a controversial caste-based survey that mentioned practically 63.1 per cent of the state’s 13.1 crore inhabitants belong to backward courses and practically 85 per cent belong to both a backward or extraordinarily backward class, or a Scheduled Caste / Tribe.
Particularly, 36 per cent of the state is from a particularly backward class, 27.1 per cent is from a backward class, 19.7 per cent is from a Scheduled Caste and 1.7 per cent is from a Scheduled Tribe. The overall class, together with so-called higher castes, account for 15.5 per cent.
The report additionally underlines the minority standing of those that establish as Muslims in Bihar; they represent lower than 18 per cent of the inhabitants whereas those that establish as Hindus account for 82 per cent. Within the 2011 Census these numbers had been 16.9 per cent and 82.7 per cent, respectively.
A deep-dive reveals the Yadav group – the group to which Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav belongs – is the biggest sub-group, accounting for 14.27 per cent of all OBC classes.
An extra deep-dive reveals that Kushwahas and Kurmis kind 4.27 and a pair of.87 per cent of the inhabitants.
Brahmins represent simply 3.66 per cent of Bihar’s individuals.
READ | Bihar Caste Survey: 27% Backward Lessons, 36% Extraordinarily Backward Lessons
The information – coming months earlier than subsequent 12 months’s Lok Sabha ballot – underlines the electoral significance of OBCs and marginalised communities – each for the BJP, which has opposed requires a nationwide caste census, and the opposition, which has been more and more increasingly more vocal on the topic.
Over the previous 5 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP has gained over OBC votes on the expense of the Congress.
Within the 1999 nationwide election the OBC vote division was even – 23 to 24 per cent. This jumped to 34 per cent to fifteen per cent in 2014 after which a large 44 per cent for the BJP 5 years later.
READ | Bihar Caste Survey Outcomes Out, Nitish Kumar Shares The Plan Forward
In Bihar, that 63 per cent OBC+ EBC is a headline quantity for the BJP. In 2019 the BJP-led NDA gained 39 of the state’s 40 seats; the BJP gained 17, JDU (then its ally) 16 and the Lok Janshakti Celebration acquired six.
The BJP and its allies, then, benefitted from OBC votes, as they did within the 2020 Bihar election, when 81 per cent of Kurmis, 51 per cent of Koeris, and 58 per cent of different OBCs/EBCs voted for them.
Illustration, although, hasn’t at all times been equal to inhabitants – some extent Congress MP Rahul Gandhi made when he mentioned solely three of 90 Secretaries to the Indian authorities had been from OBCs.
READ |“Vital To Know Caste Statistics Of India”: Rahul Gandhi On Census
The truth is, evaluating the 2015 Bihar Meeting to the 2020 one reveals a drop in MLAs from OBC and EBC communities from 48.6 per cent to 40.7. MLAs from the so-called higher castes elevated from 23.9 per cent to 29.2 per cent, whereas these from the Muslim group fell from 9.9 to 7.8 per cent.
The party-wise division of those numbers identifies the BJP as having solely 27 MLAs from OBC communities (in comparison with 34 from so-called higher castes). For the JDU this cut up was 22-10.
The RJD skew was even greater when it comes to OBC illustration – 39-13.
In the meantime, what the Bihar caste survey report additionally does is highlight the importance of OBC + EBC communities for the BJP, the Congress and all political events throughout the nation, with explicit concentrate on states voting this 12 months – Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Mizoram and Telangana.
In Telangana OBCs (as a share of households in rural areas) account for over 57 per cent. In Chhattisgarh that quantity is 51.4 per cent. That is 46.8 in Rajasthan and 42.4 in Madhya Pradesh.
The Bihar caste survey has been a polarising matter amongst India’s political events, with battle strains drawn between (primarily) the ruling BJP on one facet and various opposition events on the opposite.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, at an election occasion in Madhya Pradesh’s Gwalior right this moment, hit out at these “attempting to divide the nation within the identify of caste” – seen as a pointy response to Bihar’s caste survey.
READ |“Making an attempt To Divide Nation…”: PM After Bihar Releases Caste Survey Report
The INDIA bloc, which is pushing for a nationwide caste census to make sure higher focusing on of growth initiatives, has been boosted by the Bihar report. Rahul Gandhi – whose Congress is a part of INDIA – mentioned his occasion will order an analogous train if it wins the Madhya Pradesh election due this 12 months.