The Lost Citizens(Old publication: My Republica Dec 19, 2012)

"About 20 lakh population are not counted in 2011 census: The impact f this has created some misconception & mistrust" discussion of this aspect is produced in the unedited version of this article below:  

The census report of CBS that was launched last week is the authentic data source of the population of Nepal. Population data not only allures researchers and academicians but also allures political organizations and pressure groups. It may be because the size of the population reflects their political or social weights. In this sense we may consider the report of CBS as the indicative voter list. After the lunching of the population report by CBS many organizations have shown their deep annoyance mostly for a large disappearance of population of their concern group.  Janajati Mahasangh shown their dismay by burned the census report. Christian organizations also have shown disappointment that about 265 thousand or 1% Christians are missing in the report.

The above two events by the two organizations also show the current trend of disbelief seen in Nepal. No one now a day seems to have belief on other. Students have no belief on teachers, teachers has no belief on university, university on education Minister, Ministers in Prime Ministers, Prime Minister in President, and President for the political parties. Most society member are living with great disbelieves: customers do not believe on shopkeepers and think they always cheats them, tenants has disbelief on house owners, commuters on traffic police, voters on local leaders, and tax payers on government. Disbelief has now become a social norm.

Census taking exercise is very difficult task to perform. It needs lot of experts, experienced field workers, big budget and extensive management skills. With one hundred years of experience of conducting such population census, CBS has now become matured and has been using more sophisticated enumeration and data processing methods. For the current census 2011 as it has shown in the report, government has used more than 280 million Rupees, mostly from donation and has used human resource of more than 41 thousand and the whole process including concepts, questionnaire, training, enumeration and processing took about five years. This is why it is impossible for any other research institute to conduct similar work and challenge the findings. This time as CBS has reported it has used most inclusive human resources including Janajatis, Dalits and female for field enumeration and for supervising. This has made the census data an important national asset that can be used in national development planning and socioeconomic researches.    

When we further talk about the authenticity of the census findings first we have no other way to disprove it and second in many cases the accusing organizations also have to cross examine other related population factors while reading specific tables.  For example, about the Janajati population there were only 41 identified Janajatis in 2001 census that constitute about 31% of the population. In the 2011 census more 50 Janajati groups were identified. This increment was due to numerous scholarly contributions of the concern experts including the 2002 Janajati report by the scholars and members of Janajati Uttan Pratisthan, many of whom are now in the central committee of the new political party. This report, published by the Institute of Integrated Development Studies –IIDS was presented to the planning commission aiming to provide guideline to the 10^th National Plan. Such works and continuous meetings/dialogues of the concerned agencies have made positive impact on this census report. According to the above mentioned report, 35 Janajati groups were not included in 1991 census and 16 were excluded in 2001 census. In the current 2011 census all previously identified groups were included with the addition of some small new groups which were recorded for the first time in census such as Dolpo with population (4101) and Lhopa with population (2624). The report has listed even some small enclave of caste/ethnic groups such as Nurang with a total count of 278, Raute counting only 618 and Kusunda of size 273. This shows the good intension and improvement of the census bureau. 

However, it is also true that this report have some queer information. Every table of the census report should be observed with a ‘discount coupon’ that it has used while counting its citizens. Discount has become a fashion in most shops these days. If we spend some hours in window-shopping we can find that most shop has such announcement announcements. This time government has also made such discount ‘up to 7%’. This discount is for its citizens who are absent from the last six months in the country for better work or study abroad. The report has excluded about 1.4 million population which were reports as ‘absentee population’. Regarding the declined Janajati population as shown in the census report, we have to understand this discount and correct the census table accordingly. Although, the absentee population are not yet analyzed by ethnicity but if we look at the record of such abroad goers from the Department of Immigration it can be seen that large number of Janajati population are working abroad. Children and family of many British Gurkha got the privilege of residency in UK in the last five years and most Gurkha are Janajatis. Thus, it is obvious that the information from census is the only source of our valuable decennial information we can get about our population and it is the output of our deep efforts and utilization of big resource for which we should be proud of.