Kerala has begun preparations for the Census of India 2027, marking the start of the first population count in more than a decade after the postponement of Census 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Directorate of Census Operations (DCO), Kerala, submitted a detailed proposal to the state government on December 12, outlining preliminary administrative arrangements and the appointment of Census Officers at various levels.
As part of the initial groundwork, Kerala has started reorganising districts, towns, villages and enumeration blocks in preparation for the houselisting exercise scheduled for 2026 and the population enumeration planned for early 2027. The proposal envisages a two-phase census.
“The first phase, the Houselisting and Housing Census, will be conducted over a one-month period between April and September 2026. This phase will lay the foundation for the second and more crucial phase — Population Enumeration — scheduled for February 2027. The reference date for Census 2027 has been fixed as midnight on March 1, 2027,” said a state government official.
To ensure uniformity and accuracy in data collection, the state will be divided into a hierarchical structure of territorial jurisdictions, beginning with revenue districts and extending to urban and rural areas. Municipal corporations, municipal towns, cantonment boards and approved census towns will be treated as urban areas. Non-statutory census towns will be enumerated under rural census charges, while outgrowths will be included under urban charges.
“At the grassroots level, each town and revenue village will be subdivided into wards and further into Enumeration Blocks — the smallest units of census operations. These blocks will serve as the basic units for both houselisting and population enumeration. The proposal outlines a detailed administrative chain for census operations across Kerala. District Collectors will act as Principal Census Officers, supported by senior deputy collectors, district-level officers and sub-divisional authorities. Tahsildars will function as Charge Census Officers at the taluk level, while municipal secretaries and administrative heads will oversee census work in urban local bodies, including major municipal corporations such as Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi, Kollam and Kozhikode,” said the official.
Special arrangements have also been proposed for defence and paramilitary areas, where Special Charge Officers will be appointed in consultation with district authorities. Supervisors and Enumerators for both phases of the census will be drawn mainly from government departments and the teaching
community and they will carry out census duties in addition to their regular responsibilities.
At the state level, the Director of Census Operations, Kerala, will function as the Chief Principal Census Officer, assisted by a hierarchy of senior census officials. The proposal highlights the scale, complexity and extensive administrative coordination required to conduct the census, the world’s largest data-gathering exercise.
“The state government has formally approved the proposals submitted by the Joint Director of the DCO, clearing the way for the appointment of Census functionaries across Kerala. In its order, the government stressed that all officers appointed as Census functionaries must promptly discharge their duties upon receiving instructions from the Director of Census Operations, while ensuring that their routine official work is not adversely affected,” the official added.
The government said separate notifications appointing Census Officers, delegating powers to appoint subordinate staff and authorising them to sign statutory declarations under the Census Act, 1948, will be issued shortly. Detailed guidelines on roles and responsibilities at various stages of census operations will also follow.
On December 12, the Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, approved the proposal for Census 2027 at an estimated cost of Rs 11,718.24 crore. Nearly 30 lakh field functionaries will be deployed nationwide to complete the exercise.
“For the first time, the census will be conducted entirely through digital means, with data collection carried out using mobile applications compatible with Android and iOS platforms. A dedicated Census Management and Monitoring System portal will enable real-time supervision, while tools such as the Houselisting Block Creator web map application will assist charge officers. Citizens will also be given the option of self-enumeration,” the official said.
A significant political decision was taken on April 30, 2025, when the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs approved the inclusion of caste enumeration during the second phase of the census, reflecting India’s complex social and demographic structure.
Census 2027 will be the 16th census overall and the eighth since Independence. It will continue to serve as the most comprehensive source of village-, town- and ward-level data on housing, amenities, population, religion, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, language, literacy, economic activity, migration and fertility.
According to Census 2011, Kerala had a population of 3.34 crore, a sex ratio of 1,084 females per 1,000 males, a population density of 860 persons per square kilometre, a literacy rate of 94 per cent and a decadal growth rate of 4.9 per cent — benchmarks that Census 2027 is now set to update.
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