Census 2027 Announced: Govt Issues Notification, Here’s What You Need to Know

The Ministry of Home Affairs on Monday announced that India’s next census will be held in 2027. The notification, published in the official gazette on June 16, 2025, stated that the census will be conducted under Section 3 of the Census Act, 1948. 

As per the Home Ministry notification, the reference date for the census is set at 00:00 hours on March 1, 2027. However, for Ladakh and the snow-bound, non-synchronous areas of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, and Uttarakhand, the reference date will be 00:00 hours on October 1, 2026. 

This development comes after a 2019 notification, which had set the framework for the 2021 census, but the exercise was later postponed.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah reviewed the preparations for the upcoming census 2027 on Sunday along with Union Home Secretary Govind Mohan and other senior officials. According to the ministry, this would be India’s 16th census overall and the 8th since Independence.

The census 2027 will be held in two phases. The first phase, called the Houselisting Operation (HLO), will collect information about housing conditions, household amenities, and assets. The second phase, called the Population Enumeration (PE), will gather detailed data on demographic, socio-economic, cultural, and other aspects of every individual.

The Home Ministry also confirmed that caste-related data will be collected during the census. For the entire operation, around 34 lakh enumerators and supervisors, along with about 1.3 lakh census functionaries, will be deployed. 

According to the 84th Constitutional Amendment Act (2001), the delineation of Lok Sabha and Assembly constituencies, including the implementation of the 128th Constitutional Amendment's 33% women's reservation, will be based on the results of the first census conducted after 2026. 

Officials have hinted that the final data might not be released until after the general elections in 2029. This census 2027 will be conducted digitally through mobile applications, and a self-enumeration option will also be provided. The ministry assured that strict data security measures will be followed throughout the process of data collection, transmission, and storage.

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