‘Congress not robbed of its caste census pitch; Modi announced enumeration out of compulsion’: Digvijay Singh

In a freewheeling interview, veteran Congress leader Digvijay Singh talks about a range of issues from caste census, organisational revamp, Bihar SIR and the party’s standing in the country today.

Q. Do you feel Congress has been robbed of its caste census pitch after BJP unexpectedly announced caste enumeration in May this year?

Not at all. It is just a plain statement. It has not given or explained the intensive way — the way the Telangana government has done caste census.

Modi has announced caste enumeration out of compulsion. The point is what is the difference between Bihar caste census and Telangana caste census. Telangana caste census has been done very scientifically. I must congratulate Revanth Reddy and his team…They have been able to identify some castes which have only 15 to 20 families left. There are some which have just 100 to 150 families left. No one knows about them. They are SC, ST and OBC and upper castes also. So caste based census is an intensive data collection to understand the problems of all those sections who have not reaped the benefits of government programmes and schemes.

Q. So, you are not going to cede caste pitch to BJP. Why do you think it is important to the country?

Basically Congress is a political party which stands for each and every citizen of this country. Our focus is primarily on the deprived, on those sections who have been marginalised historically and even later on. Congress is the first political party that took untouchability as its programme against British. Mahatma Gandhi led the campaign against untouchability.

During her tenure, Indiraji paid attention to SCs and STs, houseless, landless — those who were deprived of entry into banks. Most of the banks in India were in private sector. With nationalisation of banks, the doors for the weaker section were opened in the 70’s.

Now Rahul Gandhi has sort of become very articulate and with a clear mind — particularly so after the Bharat Jodo Yatra. He has seen the pulse of the country. India is a diverse country. Yet the very idea of India, it keeps everyone together. So the Congress’ policy is not divisive but inclusive.

As far as caste based census is concerned, he (Rahul Gandhi) has put it in the right perspective. If you go as a patient, the doctor has to X-ray you and sometimes even conduct an MRI just to know the problem. Now, there are some sections in the system among the SCs, STs, OBCs and general categories also who have not been given their due because of some historical or social reason.

For example: In the tribals, there are Ati Pichda (EBC) Adivasi, who have not shared the advantages of the tribal reservation. In SCs, there are a number of SC communities who have not received fruits of the programmes and policies for them. In OBCs, there are several communities all over India who have not become the beneficiaries of the OBC reservation. Even among the upper caste, there are sections and sub sections who have not been beneficiaries of the government schemes and policies. Therefore, it is particularly to identify those sections of society who have been deprived of their due.

Q. Congress has been critical of EC’s SIR exercise in Bihar. You have even referred to EC as ‘BJP’s arm’. However, there are allegations against you as well that you also used the EC as a tool for your own benefit?

I don’t know why they (EC) are so secretive about it. One day before they announced SIR, no one knew this was going to happen. And when they announced it, they gave only a period of one month. Earlier, updating of voter list used to happen once a year; now they are doing it four times a year.

I came across the EC’s statement that they have found few lakh of people who have died, who are not living at the address they have mentioned. It is very surprising as you are updating the voter list four times in a year. Since 2003, there are so many elections which have been fought in Bihar, yet you could not get the right details.

Yes, the EC has become like a department of the BJP.  Certainly it was not like that in our time. Tell me, was there any complaint by the BJP fellow during that period, the kind we are getting now. They were treated fairly. You see the EC has gone to the extent of not agreeing to meet the representatives of the Congress party. We had asked them several times.

Q. EVM has also been an issue for you. Why?

I have personally never believed in EVMs. Basically I belong to a school which has three fundamentals. One, it is my right as a citizen of this country vote for a candidate of my choice. Two, it is my right to see and to be convinced that my vote has been correctly registered, not visually, it has to be in my hand, a hard copy. Three, it is my right to see that my vote is counted. These are my rights in a democracy. Today on the EVM, I press a button, I see for seven seconds but where does the vote go. There would be enumerable software engineers of eminence, cryptographers, who say that through a software it is quite possible what you see is not printed. It is technically possible. So the software which is fed into the VVPAT unit, why don’t you make it public. What is there to hide? We have been demanding this for a long time. Please bring it in the public domain. They say it could be hacked, that means if anyone knows the software, he can hack it. If it is full-proof, then make it public.

Q. How do you see your chances in poll-bound Bihar?

In Bihar, we are junior partner to RJD. This is a fact. It all depends on seat sharing as it happens. This is something which needs to be looked at, which are the seats given to us.

Q. Where do you see Congress standing in the country today?

Let us be very frank. Organisationally BJP is much ahead of us. Organisationally, some of the regional parties are much ahead of us. So this is where Congress is lacking. It is good to know that Rahul Gandhi has taken the organisational thing very seriously. He has set up ‘Sangathan Srijan Abhiyan’ to identify the best possible DCC presidents where they will be given three-days’ training, after that 10 days training; then they will be given a task and then they have to build the organisation from district down to the lowest habitation that includes mohallas, panchayats, polling booths and wards.