LUCKNOW: The birth certificate officially gets a twin in UP: the caste certificate. A meeting chaired by CM Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday decided to institutionalise dual certificates — of birth and caste — for every newborn child within 15 days of an application being made.
The decision is seen as an extension of BJP’s renewed bid to seamlessly implement welfare schemes for socially backward communities that played a crucial role in the party getting a second consecutive term in office. A government official termed it a “fantastic idea” for precise and systematic execution of welfare schemes in the long run. The pre-Independence practice of conducting a caste-wise census was discontinued post-1931, which is why there is no census data on the population of OBCs in the country. The Mandal Commission estimated the OBC population at 52%, while the National Sample Survey Organisation, based on its 61st survey (2004-05), pegged it at 41%.
