A survey has to be for a specific purpose. What is described as a household survey in Telangana is more like a census, though it is focused on items like property tax assessments, LPG and electricity connections, bank accounts, Aadhaar card, caste and birth certificates, vehicle- and land-ownership. If reports are to be believed, the government is stuck with a problem because there are an insufficient number of enumerators and number of households was under-estimated. That is all the more reason to use existing data efficiently, instead of embarking on a fresh round of data collection. On all the items mentioned, there are existing databases, within the government and quasi-government system. Or does government believe these existing databases can?t be trusted? In that event, what is the guarantee the present survey will be free of distortions? Nor are there clear guarantees about privacy and secrecy of data. If a mapping exercise of all households in the entire state is intended, there are better ways, instead of shutting the state down for an entire day. No sensible survey or census can be accomplished in a single day and is always staggered.
The survey is meant to weed out bogus beneficiaries of anti-poverty programmes. If that be the case, why does one need to map everyone, instead of those who are BPL? There are two kinds of errors possible with BPL cards. One includes those who shouldn?t be excluded and one excludes those who should be included. In either case, one needs some definition of who is BPL. No survey of existing BPL card-holders can identify errors of omission. On errors of commission, what precisely does a survey pinpoint? It can identify existing BPL card-holders who do not reside at a specific address. Rural areas are different. But, in urban areas, it is not uncommon for poor people, especially migrant labour, to furnish an address that is not their own, since residential proof is difficult to obtain. That doesn?t necessarily prove white ration card-holders are undeserving of subsidies. Whichever way one looks at it, two questions should have been answered. First, what do existing consolidated databases show? Second, what?s the criteria for BPL? In the absence of clear answers to these, political motives are understandably being attributed to the intensive household survey, in terms of segregating those who should reside in Seemandhra from those from Telangana.
