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History of Census in India
Online Resrouces

January 2020

While heated debates and protests going on in India about new laws on citizenship and population register (2019-20), we bring a list of resources and links on how and when were the first population census were conducted in India, and what they meant for the demographics and social identity of the people.
If you know of any important links that are missing here, do let us know.

History of Census in India
http://censusindia.gov.in/Ad_Campaign/drop_in_articles/05-History_of_Census_in_India.pdf

Census of India prior to independence (Wikipedia)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Census_of_India_prior_to_independence

LEGAL ASPECTS OF COLONIAL CENSUS POLICY IN INDIA (1872 -1948), Pradeep Kumar
http://ili.ac.in/pdf/p12_pradeep.pdf

Census and caste enumeration: British legacy and contemporary practice in India, RAM B. BHAGAT
https://www.jstor.org/stable/29789312

MEMORANDUM ON THE CENSUS OF BRITISH INDIA OF 1871-72 (London)
https://ruralindiaonline.org/library/resource/memorandum-on-the-census-of-british-india-of-1871-72/

Census of India Reports from 1871 to 1901
https://arrow.latrobe.edu.au/store/3/4/5/5/2/public/census.htm

Digitization of Census of India 1872-1941 volumes in IIPS: An announcement, D.D. Mestri, F.Ram
http://iipsindia.org/pdf/dig.pap.pdf

Indian Economy on the Eve of Independence, Demographic Condition
https://toppr.com/guides/economics/indian-economy-on-the-eve-of-independence/demographic-condition/

Statistical abstract relating to British India. From 1840 to 1920
https://dsal.uchicago.edu/statistics/

Why does the Census of India focus on mother tongues? How does it make linguistic minorities invisible?
G. Seetharaman
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/why-does-the-census-of-india-focus-on-mother-tongues-how-does-it-make-linguistic-minorities-invisible/articleshow/69178250.cms

CENSUS AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF COMMUNALISM IN INDIA, R.B.Bhagat
http://www.sacw.net/2002/CensusandCommunalism.html

Census 1931: Why It’s Relevant Now More Than Ever, Shrikanth Krishnamachary
https://swarajyamag.com/ideas/census-1931-why-its-relevant-now-more-than-ever

The Tribe in the Early Census Reports:Constructing the Nation, Hindu and Outside Hindu
https://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/1705/7/07_chapter%203.pdf

The Bengal Famine: How the British engineered the worst genocide in human history for profit, Rakhi Chakraborty
https://yourstory.com/2014/08/bengal-famine-genocide/

Religious Demography of India (CPS)
https://cpsindia.org/dl/religious/summary3c.pdf

Caste Confusion and Census Enumeration in Colonial India, 1871-1921, KEVIN WALBY and MICHAEL HAAN
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/495636

The Census of India 1881 - 1931 (Samanvaya)
http://samanvaya.com/main/contentframes/knowledge/articles/census1881.html

Population Bomb? The Debate over Indian Population, Mytheli Sreenivas
https://origins.osu.edu/article/population-bomb-debate-over-indian-population

Agricultural Census (in India)
http://agcensus.nic.in/document/agcensus9596/Introduction.pdf

British Rule and Tribal Revolts in India: The curious case of Bastar, Ajay Verghese
https://cambridge.org/core/journals/modern-asian-studies/article/british-rule-and-tribal- revolts-
in-india-the-curious-case-of-bastar/D1F52864F0CBD6D37FFC2B7DE9CBA5A4/core-reader

Questionaires used in earliest census
http://censusindia.gov.in/Data_Products/Library/Indian_perceptive_link/Census_
Questionaires_link/questions.htm

This list is in progress. Please let us know if you know of some good archive on the Internet which concerns us and we may have missed. Please report if you find any dead links.

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