Census body considering inclusion of transgenders

A decision on enumeration of transgenders in the second phase of Census 2011 would be taken in consultations with experts, a top official said on Friday.

"We are receiving several representations seeking to include transgenders in the population list. After consulting experts, a decision will be taken soon," Registrar General and National Census Commissioner Dr C Chandramouli said.

Census is being conducted in two phases -- house listing and housing census in 2010 (launched on April 1) and household population census to be taken up in February 2011.

During the household population census, homeless people, persons lodged in prison, staying in hostels and other places would also be covered, Chandramouli said.

He said the census data would be extracted automatically by high-speed scanning of the census forms using a high-tech and advance intelligent character recognition software.

"This revolutionary technology has enabled the processing of voluminous data in a very short time and saving a huge amount of manual labour and cost," he said.

Stating that the Centre would be spending about Rs 6,000 crore for the census process, he said this amount might go up.

Explaining about the National Population Register process, the official said personal details such as name, date of birth, sex and present address among others would be gathered.

"The collected data would be entered into computers in the local language of the state as well as in English. Once the database has been created, biometrics such as photograph and fingerprints will be added for all persons aged 15 and above".

The list after authentication would be sent to the Unique Identity Authority of India (UIDAI) for de-duplication and issue of UID numbers, he said, adding all duplications would be eliminated at this stage.

After completion of NPR, National Identity Cards would be given in phased manner to all residents, he said.

To start with, the cards would be issued in coastal villages. "After this, coastal towns will be covered and so on till the entire country is covered. This whole process will be completed by 2013," he said.

To a question whether the NIC would be given to NRIs, he said the card was only meant for Indian residents. "If they (NRI) want to stay in the country for a minimum of six months, they are eligible to apply for NIC," he said.