Hyderabad: The Centre has taken a concrete step toward rolling out Census 2027, officially launching the tender process for printing the vast set of materials required for the nationwide headcount, delayed since 2021.
The Office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India (ORGI), which operates under the Ministry of Home Affairs, has issued a call to empanel offset printing firms for a two-year contract. These printers will be responsible for the full production process—designing, printing, binding, and packaging key documents such as census schedules, data forms, and instruction manuals.
All materials are to be produced using offset printing technology and in multiple languages, including Hindi, English, and several regional tongues. The selected printers will handle everything from designing and printing to binding and packaging essential documents—census schedules, forms, and instruction manuals among them.
Offset printing will be used to produce these materials in Hindi, English, and various regional languages. The tender rollout comes as the government officially puts census operations back in motion after a prolonged delay. Now, officials have scheduled the 2021 census to be carried out in 2027.
ORGI officials say printing is one of the most critical pieces of the puzzle, given the massive volume of paperwork involved and the logistics of distributing it across the country. The tender process is designed to ensure the job is carried out with both transparency and efficiency.
Printers selected for the work will need to return all pre- and post-press materials—both digital files and physical copies—once the job is completed. Payment will only be released after ORGI gives formal approval of the final output.
Officials stress that the census isn’t just a headcount—it’s the backbone of how India plans its policies. It delivers granular data on population, languages, literacy, migration, and economic activity, right down to the village level. That information is crucial for everything from government schemes to infrastructure planning.