ISLAMABAD: The next census will be held in March of 2017. According to media reports, the Chief Census Commissioner Asif Bajwa on Monday unveiled the plan for the sixth population census. It was revealed that the census would be held in two phases and would be conducted under the supervision of the armed forces in selected areas.
Bajwa informed media that the first phase would be initiated on March 15, 2017 and would end on May 15, 2017. He said that 45,000 personnel of the armed forces would be deployed along with the enumerators. Moreover, provinces have been asked to identify sensitive areas which would be handed over to the armed forces for holding the exercise.
According to media reports, the plan approved by the Council of Common Interests (CCI) lays out the procedure put forth by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS). The procedure is as follows:
- a) Census may be carried out using traditional method of paper based questionnaires starting from 15 March, 2017.
- b) The House Listing process and Census Operation may be conducted simultaneously. Form-2 will be used in the Census Operation, while Form 2-A will be filled on sample basis after the whole operation is over.
- c) Census may be held in two phases; however, each phase may simultaneously be carried out in all the provinces.
- d) All relevant stakeholders at the federal and provincial level may be directed to cooperate with PBS with regards to carrying out of census operation.
Furthermore, Balochistan will be covered fully in phase one while the remaining provinces will be divided into two phases. Fata, AJK and Gilgit-Baltistan will be covered in the second phase. The government has selected certain divisions of Pakistan for phase one. In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Peshawar and Mardan divisions have been selected for phase one under which 2,184 and 1,305 enumerators will conduct housing and population census respectively under the supervision of the armed forces.
The government has identified Lahore, Faisalabad, Sargodha and Dera Ghazi Khan for phase one under which 6,825, 5,519, 3,457 and 4,196 enumerators have been designated for each division respectively.
PBS has appointed 639 enumerators in the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) to undertake the census in 1278 blocks.
The government has also selected Karachi, Hyderabad and Mirpurkhas for phase one under which 7,118, 4,461 and 1,365 enumerators have been designated respectively. The government has selected Quetta, Zhob, Sibi, Naseerabad, Kalat and Makran from Balochistan in the first phase and appointed 1,064, 649, 579, 540, 1,690 and 429 enumerators respectively.
For the second phase, the government has selected Hazara, Malakand, Kohat, Bannu and D.I Khan from KP and has designated 2,643, 2,609, 677, 628 and 651 enumerators respectively.
FATA has also been selected for the second phase and 1897 enumerators have been assigned for the purpose. For Punjab’s second phase, the government has selected divisions of Gujranwala, Rawalpindi, Bahwalpur, Multan and Sahiwal and appointed 6,488, 4,415, 4,651 and 4,717 enumerators respectively.
For Sindh, with regards to the second phase, the government has selected the divisions of Larkana, Sukkur and Shaheed Benazirabad by deputing 3,029, 2,580 and 2,040 enumerators respectively. Moreover, Azad Jammu & Kashmir (AJK) and Gilgit-Baltistan will also be covered in the second phase for which the government is going to assign 2008 and 623 enumerators respectively.
