The Caste Con Census: This book maps caste and other social fractures

In support of his arguments, author cites scholarship spanning history, sociology, anthropology and political economy

The Caste Con Census 

by Anand Teltumbde 

Published by Navayana Books

243 pages ₹499

What should we do with caste? Annihilate it, says Anand Teltumbde echoing B R Ambedkar, not count it, because if we start on that exercise we will be doing it till kingdom come. The net effect of a caste census, he argues, will be no better than the decennial census, launched in 1871 and formalised in 1881, (and the ones that followed) which only strengthened caste, transforming social affiliations into rigid and state-recognised categories, enabling a “segmental control of society”. 

In April 2025, the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs approved