New Delhi: Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday welcomed the government's "sudden" decision to include caste enumeration in the forthcoming census after "11 years of opposing it", but insisted that a timeline should be provided for its implementation.

Call for a clear timeline

His comments came just hours after the government announced that caste enumeration would be included in the next census exercise in a "transparent" manner.

Addressing a press conference in the capital, the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha said, "We support this (government's decision) completely but we want a timeline. We want to know by when it will be done."

Praising Telangana as a model

Welcoming the Narendra Modi government's "sudden" shift in policy, Gandhi said, "This is the first step and Telangana is a model for caste census."

Demands beyond enumeration

Reiterating the Congress’s longstanding demands, Gandhi called for the removal of the 50 per cent cap on reservations and said that funds should be allocated to support the caste census.

"We want people's census, not bureaucrats' census," he added.

Opposition’s push for caste census

Opposition parties, including the Congress, have made a nationwide caste census a major electoral issue. Some states such as Bihar, Telangana and Karnataka have already conducted similar surveys.

Government’s announcement

Announcing the decision taken by the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs, Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw stated that the census falls under the Centre’s purview. He added that some states had conducted caste enumeration under the guise of surveys "non-transparently", which had "created doubts in the society."

PTI inputs