In a letter to the DoE, the CBS has categorically asked it not to appoint teachers who are above 45 years of age. "We want younger teachers as enumerators," said Dr Rudra Suwal, director of CBS. "We will not accept older teachers." [break]
Previously, the CBS had never set any age bar for teachers working as enumerators. The CBS decision to involve only younger teachers in the country´s biggest head-count comes following complaints of errors in collecting data during past censuses.
"We have learnt many lessons from previous censuses, one of which is that older teachers may make more mistakes in filling up the questionnaires," Dr Suwal said. "The minor slips in collecting data could lead to wrong conclusions at the end. Therefore, we have decided not to appoint older teachers."
During the 11th census, which will be carried out from June 17 to 27, over 34,000 primary school teachers will be mobilized as enumerators. Similarly, more than 8,000 lower secondary level teachers will be mobilized as supervisors. The new age bar of 45 years will be in effect for both enumerators and supervisors.
The CBS has also asked the DoE to prioritize teachers who are native to the communities where they will be doing the head count and know local languages, when selecting enumerators. The CBS decision to prioritize local language-speaking teachers comes in the wake of mounting pressure from ethnic organizations to ensure proportional participation of indigenous teachers in the census process.
No probe of live-in relations
In the upcoming census, the CBS will be dealing with some sensitive issues like third-gender, displacement by the insurgency, women´s fertility and child mortality. In soon-to-be-held training for enumerators, CBS officials will ask them to prod interviewees into disclosing further details while filling up questionnaires. However, there are some issues which enumerators will not be allowed to probe.
"The growing social phenomenon of live-in relations is one such sensitive issue," said Dr Suwal. "We have designed our questionnaires in such a way that enumerators will be satisfied when couples say they are married or not married yet. The enumerators will not prod further when a couple says they are yet to be married. Those who are living in a relationship will not be embarrassed while responding to enumerators."
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