New Delhi: Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati once again reiterated her support for a caste census, asking the Union government to undertake the exercise across the country.
Her statement comes after the Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav raised the demand for a caste census in the Uttar Pradesh assembly on Thursday. He had said, “All of us in the opposition want caste-based census”.
According to the Times of India, Mayawati also criticised the SP, asking the party why it did not get the census done during its tenure. If that was done, the party that would not have required to raise this demand “again and again under the BJP government,” she said.
Flaying the Samajwadi Party for its repeated demands for caste census in Uttar Pradesh, the former chief minister in a press statement said the party should have got the exercise done its own regime in the past.
23-02-2023-BSP PRESS NOTE-UP BUDGET EXPECTATION AND CASTE CENSUS pic.twitter.com/UvqPKj0X6g
— Mayawati (@Mayawati) February 23, 2023
“The caste census should be held not only in UP but across the country. At the same time, they should come up with an accurate caste-wise population figures. For that, the Central government will have to come forward,” the BSP’s statement said.
In the past too, Mayawati has raised the demand for a nationwide caste census. “BSP supports the demand of OBC community for caste census. Due to ‘jatiwadi mansikta’ (casteiest mentality), the Centre is ignoring the demand,” she charged in November 2021.
In neighbouring Bihar, the Nitish Kumar-Tejashwi Yadav government has begun the caste census process.