India begins to count its poor

A nationwide socio-economic and caste census to identify people living below poverty line (BPL) was on Wednesday flagged off from Shankhola, a remote tribal hamlet in Tripura West district.

Rural Development Secretary B K Sinha said, "Those names would be deleted from the list of BPL beneficiaries who own a vehicle or two-wheelers, pucca houses, land phone, fishing trawler besides government employees having income above Rs 10,000 or holders of Kisan Credit Cards with Rs 50,000 or paying income tax."

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This was the first time the BPL census would include urban households and Chandigarh would be the first city where the caste census would begin on July 18, he said.

Registrar General of India and Census Commissioner C Chandramauli said, "This programme of enumeration of poor in the country would be completed within forty days from today."

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The survey is being jointly conducted by Ministry of Rural Development and Department of Census after 14 years.

Officials hoped that the data collected by this census would also help implementing the Food Security Act and providing subsidies to the poor.