New Delhi: The Union government has notified the Census 2027 – which will now be published six years after the scheduled 2021 exercise.

The Union home ministry released a gazette notification on June 16 (today), saying that the reference date for the census will be midnight of March 1, 2027 in all states and union territories except for "Ladakh and [the] snow-bound, non-synchronous areas of the Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir and the States of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand."

The reference date for these areas will be midnight of October 1, 2026, the notification says.

It notes that the March 2019 declaration of the Union government to conduct the census in 2021, is now cancelled.

"In exercise of the powers conferred by section 3 of the Census Act, 1948 (37 of 1948), and in supersession of the notification of the Government of India in the Ministry of Home Affairs (Office of the Registrar General, India) number S.O. 1455(E), dated the 26th March, 2019 published in the Gazette of India, Extraordinary, Part II, section 3, sub-section (ii), dated the 28th March, 2019, except as respects things done or omitted to be done before such supersession, the Central Government hereby declares that a census of the population of India shall be taken during the year 2027."

The notification is signed by Mritunjay Kumar Narayan, Registrar General and Census Commissioner.

This census will have caste data, in answer to one of the major demands by almost all opposition parties in India.

In phase one of the exercise, called Housing Listing Operation, housing conditions, assets and amenities of each household will be collected. In phase two, called Population Enumeration (PE), the demographic, socio-economic, cultural and other details of every person in each household will be collected.

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