Census Rules 1990 amended to allow private school teachers to be put on census duty

Amid the ongoing digital census, the Centre has made a major policy change. According to a notification issued by the Union Home Ministry, teachers of private schools can now be deployed on census work along with government employees.

For this, the government has formally amended the decades-old Census Rules, 1990. The decision has caused a stir among private educational institutions, because until now the entire responsibility for such national surveys and counting work rested only on government employees and teachers of Zilla Parishad or government schools.

The Centre had to make the legal change because several High Courts recently barred the deployment of private school staff on census work. The Allahabad High Court in Uttar Pradesh, the Bombay High Court in Maharashtra and the Punjab and Haryana High Court in Haryana had granted interim relief while hearing separate petitions.

These courts held that under the old rules of 1990 there was no clear legal authority to compel teachers of private institutions that receive no government aid to do non-academic work. The rulings were affecting work on the ground. To deal with this, the Centre chose to change the rules themselves.

Under the amended rules, state and Union Territory administrations have been given clear legal power to take the services of staff of any recognised or unrecognised school. According to the new gazette notification, the rule covers all aided and unaided private educational institutions, besides schools run by the government and local bodies. Teachers and non-teaching staff of schools run through a trust, society or private committee will also be fully covered by this national duty.

Not only teachers will be assigned duties. To increase the number of enumerators and supervisors, the government has looked beyond school teachers and brought several other sectors into the scheme. Under the amendments, clerical staff of the Centre and state governments, employees of municipal corporations and local bodies, and employees of public sector undertakings (PSUs) can also be deployed.

Beyond this, employees of nationalised and private banks, statutory bodies, private companies and officers of many government and non-government institutions can also be ordered to collect data door to door if required.