Work ahead: Socio-economic survey puts rural India in poor light, has no caste data

New Delhi: After much delay, the government finally released the data of the Socio-Economic and Caste Census 2011, which highlighted rural distress and backwardness. The caste data has not been released, with the government saying it was up to the DG (Census) to take a call on what to do with the enumeration of individual castes in the country.

The government released the economic data of the census, which revealed that a meagre 4.6 per cent of all rural households in the country pay income-tax, while such households with salaried income are close to just 10 per cent. Union finance minister Arun Jaitely and minister for rural development Choudhary Birendra Singh jointly released the economic data of the census.

As per the SECC 2011 released on Friday, there are about 83.06 lakh households in TS to AP’s 1.22 crore households. The first installment of the SECC report that was released on Friday covers the rural parts of the country.

Rural TS has about 57.06 lakh households while AP has 92.97 lakh households. Despite this, rural TS has a higher number of salaried households than AP. Also, more salaried households in rural TS pay income or professional taxes than AP. About 6 per cent of all salaried households in rural TS pay taxes while in AP it’s half the number.

Also, more people in Telangana own mobiles phones and refrigerators. More than 83 per cent of the rural population in TS own mobile phones. The land ownership patterns in the two states have also thrown up interesting facts. Unirrigated land in AP constitutes about 24 per cent while in TS it is 31 per cent.

Proportion of agricultural lands, which receive assured irrigation water in the two states, is the same at 36 per cent. The quantum of land though is higher in AP. AP, however, has beaten TS in terms of education as a higher proportion of the TS rural population is still illiterate.

Majority of the rural populations in the two states derive their income from manual causal labour. A whopping 59 per cent of AP’s rural population comprises casual labourers while nearly half of the rural TS population comprises casual labourers.

The SECC 2011 data shows that about 26 per cent of the TS rural population derives its income from cultivation. The corresponding figure in AP is lesser at 22 per cent.