New Delhi, Nov 9 (PTI) The Registrar General of India has mapped 24.25 lakh Houselisting Blocks, micro-units of up to 800 individuals that form the foundation of the country’s population headcount, using a special software developed for the purpose, an official communique said.
The RGI used an ancillary application of the Census Management and Monitoring System (CMMS), a bespoke software backbone, designed to monitor the Census exercise in near real time, to map these blocks across the country.
Each House-Listing Block (HLB) of the House-listing and Housing Census will normally be taken as an Enumeration Block (EB) for Population Enumeration in the Census, a two-phased process — the first stage is known as house listing and housing census, and the second stage is population enumeration.
The Houselisting Operation (HLO), constituting the first phase of Census 2027, was successfully completed across the States and Union Territories, except Manipur.
“During this phase, extensive digital mapping activities were also carried out through the Houselisting Block Creator (HLBC) Web Mapping Application, an ancillary application of the Census Management and Monitoring System (CMMS)…The application facilitated the digital demarcation of approximately 24.25 lakh Houselisting Blocks (HLBs) across the country, thereby creating a comprehensive geospatial framework for Census 2027,” Registrar General of India and Census Commissioner Mrityunjay Kumar Narayan said in a latest communique.
For the second phase of the Census, in which the population headcount will begin soon in areas other than Ladakh and in snow-bound, non-synchronous areas of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand and Manipur, the HLBs will form the basis for creating Enumeration Blocks for population enumeration.
In his latest letter to all states and union territories, Narayan said that, building on the successful completion of the HLO phase, certain mapping activities are required before the Population Enumeration (PE) phase begins.
“These include correction of Administrative Unit boundaries, if any, resolution of overlapping HLBs, coverage of Uncovered Habitation Areas, if any, splitting HLBs with more than manageable workload of an Enumerator by generation of Sub-Enumeration Blocks (Sub-EBs) and Supervisory Circle Maps,” the letter said.
Narayan said timely completion of these activities is extremely essential for ensuring complete geographic coverage without any omission or duplication of the habitation areas in the Enumeration Blocks and also operational preparedness for Population Enumeration.
The decennial exercise, scheduled for 2021, was postponed due to the COVID-19 outbreak. The Union Cabinet has approved Rs 11,718 crore for conducting the Census, which will be the biggest headcount exercise.
Population enumeration in Goa, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and areas other than snow-bound areas of Uttarakhand will take place from December 1, 2026, to January 4, 2027, because of the assembly elections. The Central Government has deferred the house-listing operations for Census 2027 for Manipur, a notification issued by RGI said last month.
The exercise in Ladakh and snow-bound non-synchronous areas of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, and Uttarakhand took place from September 1 to 30.
In the rest of the country, the population census shall be undertaken from January 25, 2027, to February 28, 2027. PTI ABS NB
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