Chandigarh: The Centre has announced the schedule for the population enumeration phase of Census 2027, with the nationwide exercise set to run from January 25 to February 28, 2027, in most states and Union territories. A revisional round will follow from March 1 to March 5.
The schedule was notified by the Ministry of Home Affairs through the Office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India. The notification, issued on October 30, also provides citizens with the option of completing self-enumeration between January 10 and January 24, before the house-to-house population count begins.
The government has fixed 00:00 hours on March 1, 2027, as the reference date for the exercise covered by this notification.
Census 2027: Important Dates To Remember
The main population enumeration schedule includes three key dates:
– Self-enumeration: January 10 to January 24, 2027
– House-to-house population enumeration: January 25 to February 28, 2027
– Revisional round: March 1 to March 5, 2027
The self-enumeration facility will open before the start of the door-to-door exercise, allowing people to submit their details themselves during the designated period.
Which States And Regions Are Excluded From The January-February Schedule?
The January 25-February 28 schedule will not apply to every part of the country.
The notification excludes Manipur until further orders, along with Goa, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Ladakh and snow-bound non-synchronous areas of Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir.
However, these exclusions do not mean that all these regions will follow the same later schedule. The four poll-bound states of Goa, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and non-snow-bound areas of Uttarakhand have been assigned a separate, earlier timetable.
According to the Census of India website, self-enumeration in these areas is scheduled from November 16 to November 30, 2026. Door-to-door population enumeration will take place from December 1, 2026, to January 4, 2027, followed by a revisional round from January 5 to January 9.
Ladakh and the snow-bound areas of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand also have a separate schedule.
What Is The Reference Date For Census 2027?
For the regions covered by the October 30 notification, the reference date is midnight at the beginning of March 1, 2027.
A census reference date is the fixed point in time used to determine the population being counted. It provides a common basis for recording demographic details, including age and other personal information.
The reference date is not uniform across all regions. The separate schedules for poll-bound states and snow-bound areas have different reference dates.
Why Is Census 2027 Significant?
The last nationwide decennial Census was conducted in 2011. The 2021 Census was postponed amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Census 2027 is being conducted in two broad phases. The first phase covers house listing and the housing census, while the second focuses on population enumeration, during which individual-level demographic information will be collected.
The population enumeration phase will therefore provide the next major nationwide count of India’s population after the 2011 Census.
