The High-Level Committee on Demographic Changes (HLCDC), appointed by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, has launched a public web portal inviting citizens, government bodies, NGOs, institutions and reportedly even international organisations to submit information on “frequent” or “unnatural” demographic changes in India, preferably those observed after the 2011 Census.

The portal, launched on Wednesday by committee chairperson Justice Prakash Prabhakar Naolekar (retired), is live at demography.mha.gov.in and is described by the Home Ministry as fully operational for public access, stakeholder submissions and data interaction.

What the portal seeks

The platform allows Central ministries and departments, State and Union Territory governments, NGOs and institutions, and individuals to furnish inputs, data and information on unnatural demographic changes, their causes, underlying factors and abnormal settlement patterns.

According to a report in Hindustan Times, the form asks respondents to describe major demographic changes in their area, identify possible causes, outline challenges, and explain effects on employment, education, healthcare, housing and social harmony.

It also invites supporting material such as photographs, maps, media reports and court documents, and asks about programmes implemented by local bodies, NGOs and academic institutions.

The committee has indicated a preference for information relating to the period after 2011, the year of India’s most recent completed Census.

Personal data and consent

The submission form mandatorily seeks the respondent’s mobile phone number, address and e-mail ID, and requires consent for the processing of personal data and for the review and analysis of the information provided.

The portal’s stated purpose is to enable “scientific” data gathering and public engagement, though the ministry’s formal release does not detail retention periods, access controls or safeguards for submissions.

The inclusion of international organisations among potential respondents marks a notably wide information-gathering net for a panel whose core mandate centres on illegal immigration, cross-border movement and demographic imbalance.

Panel’s mandate

The MHA constituted the HLCDC on May 26, 2026, to examine challenges arising from demographic change, including those attributed to illegal immigration. Its terms of reference include studying fertility variations, cross-border movement, economic opportunities and socio-environmental factors; analysing structural population changes among religious and social communities; and identifying factors such as illegal immigration, abnormal settlement patterns and planned migration.

The committee is also required to recommend a permanent operational system for the “legal, fair and time-bound identification, detention, and deportation” of illegal immigrants residing in India, alongside mechanisms for border management, population stabilisation and sustained monitoring of demographic trends.

'Administrative lapses' cited

In its resolution constituting the panel, the Home Ministry said demographic shifts in some regions were not attributable solely to normal fertility or mortality trends, but also to external factors including illegal immigration, irregular population movement and administrative lapses. It added that such changes had affected public service delivery, local governance, resource distribution and social cohesion.

The committee, which includes Census Commissioner Mritunjay Kumar Narayan, former IAS officer Durga Shanker Mishra, former IPS officer Balaji Srivastava and economist Shamika Ravi, has been asked to submit its report within a year, with a possible six-month extension.

The portal launch follows the committee’s earlier request to all State chief secretaries for responses to 35 questions, including district-wise and religion-wise data on visible demographic changes, tribal population composition, religious conversion surveys, vehicle registrations and property transactions.

The exercise comes amid the absence of a new Census since 2011, leaving policymakers without updated official population data at the district level. Critics are likely to scrutinise both the evidentiary value of crowd-sourced demographic claims and the privacy implications of a government portal collecting identifiable personal information from citizens.