Census 2027: Houselisting operations will be conducted between April 1 and September 30

New Delhi: The Ministry of Home Affairs on Wednesday issued a notification announcing the schedule for Phase I of Census 2027, covering houselisting and housing census operations. The exercise will be carried out in all states and Union Territories between April 1 and September 30, 2026, over a 30-day period to be notified separately by each state or UT.

According to the notification issued by Registrar General of India and Census Commissioner Mrityunjay Kumar Narayan, households will also be given the option of self-enumeration. This facility will be available for 15 days prior to the start of the door-to-door houselisting exercise, based on the schedule announced by individual states and UTs.

Houselisting and housing census form the foundation of the population enumeration process, as they involve listing all buildings, houses and households to create an accurate framework for the final population count.

The decadal census exercise, originally scheduled for 2021, was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Census 2027 will be conducted in two phases — Phase I covering houselisting and housing census from April to September 2026, and Phase II covering population enumeration in February 2027.

The upcoming census will be India’s first fully digital census, with around 30 lakh enumerators collecting data using mobile applications compatible with Android and iOS platforms. The government has said this will help improve data quality and efficiency.

The population enumeration phase will also include caste data, a move approved by the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in April last year. Caste data was last comprehensively collected during the British era between 1881 and 1931 and has not been part of census exercises since Independence.

As per Census 2011, India’s population stood at 1,210.19 million, with 623.72 million males and 586.46 million females.