Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi proposing that the recently concluded Telangana caste survey be used as the template for the nationwide census announced by the government last week.

In a letter to Modi on Monday, Kharge said: "The design of the census questionnaire is crucial. Caste information has to be collected not for counting purposes but for achieving larger socio-economic objectives. The recently concluded Telangana caste survey was designed and implemented with such goals in mind. The Union home ministry must draw upon the Telangana model — both the methodology adopted for finalising the questionnaire as well as the final set of questions asked."

He also stressed the need for transparency. "Nothing in the report published finally should be concealed so that complete socio-economic data of each caste is made available to provide them their constitutionally enabled rights, and the socio-economic progress can be measured from one census to another."

The Telangana survey, conducted by the Congress government of Revanth Reddy, was designed to draw up the share of the population of different castes, their education levels, employment and economic status, and the power of the social networks of each social group in various walks of life, including politics, government, business, media and judiciary.