Vizianagaram district administration has been making arrangements for the caste survey in a fool-proof manner as the government is very keen about the data which would be used in formulation of policies in accordance to the needs of the people. As the higher authorities are monitoring the issue on a day-to-day basis, the District Collector S. Nagalakshmi and Joint Collector K. Mayur Ashok directed all the officials to provide adequate training for the staff and volunteers who would take up caste survey from November 27 to December 3 in all mandals of the district.
According to the officials, the mandal-level nodal officers and master trainers will train enumerators, supervisors, ward secretariat staff and volunteers for next couple of days in collecting the data from the people. Apart from gathering data of names, ages, sex, caste, sub-caste and region, the teams have to collect information with regard to economic status of the people. Property of land, houses, live stock, professional activity, income sources, educational qualification, access to cooking gas, clean water, toilet facility and other points will also be uploaded.
“People need not worry about providing authentic information to survey teams. They should not have any fear about stopping of benefits of welfare schemes since data is collected to know the economic condition of the people belonged to different castes,” she said while speaking to The Hindu here on Tuesday. “The people who could not provide data during the stipulated week period can provide the information on December 10 when all details will be checked finally,” she added. According to her, BC, SC, ST, minorities’ welfare departments, Panchayat Raj, civic bodies and others have to work with tandem. Internal help desks are being set up to clear the doubts of the survey teams.
Meanwhile, leaders of opposition parties and communities expressed displeasure over the allocation of insufficient time period for the survey. They asked the government to continue survey for 15 days to collect the data accurately since data collection of sub-castes would be a challenging process.
