India finally has a calendar for the headcount it has waited 16 years for. The Office of the Registrar General of India has notified that the population enumeration phase of Census 2027 will run as a house-to-house exercise from January 25 to February 28, 2027, with an online self-enumeration window opening two weeks earlier, on January 10. The notification, issued on Friday, October 30, 2026, under the Census Act, 1948, and signed by Registrar General and Census Commissioner Mritunjay Kumar Narayan, sets 00:00 hours on March 1, 2027 as the official reference moment for the count.
Why this census matters so much
India's last census was held in 2011. The exercise planned for 2021 was pushed back because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and since then policymakers have been working with projections rather than fresh headcounts. Everything from the allocation of welfare benefits and ration quotas to the planning of schools, hospitals and roads leans on census data, so a 16-year gap has been felt across government.
The census is being held in two phases. The first, the houselisting and housing census, ran from April 1 to September 30, 2026, and was completed across the country except in Manipur. The second phase, the actual population enumeration, is what the new notification covers.
Census 2027: the key dates
| Online self-enumeration | January 10 to January 24, 2027 |
| House-to-house enumeration | January 25 to February 28, 2027 |
| Revisional round | March 1 to March 5, 2027 |
| Reference date and time | 00:00 hours, March 1, 2027 |
| Notified by | Registrar General of India, under the Census Act, 1948 |
| Phase 1 (houselisting) | Completed April 1 to September 30, 2026 |
Which states and UTs have a different schedule
The January–February window does not apply everywhere. The notification leaves out four poll-bound states, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand and Goa, where elections are due and the administrative machinery will be stretched. It also excludes the Union Territory of Ladakh and the snow-bound, non-synchronous areas of Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir, where winter makes door-to-door work in January and February impractical. Separate dates are being set for these areas.
Manipur is the exception within the exception. The exercise there has been held back "till further declaration", in line with the state not completing the first phase either because of the prolonged ethnic violence.
How self-enumeration will work
For the first time in an Indian census, households will be able to fill in their own details online before the enumerator arrives. The self-enumeration portal is meant to cut down the time spent at each doorstep and reduce errors in names and dates. Households that self-enumerate will still be visited during the house-to-house round so the details can be confirmed.
Here is what a typical household can expect:
- January 10–24: Fill in household details on the official self-enumeration portal if you want to save time.
- January 25–February 28: An enumerator visits your home, records or verifies the details and asks the census questions.
- March 1–5: A short revisional round picks up births, deaths and any households missed earlier, so the count reflects the population at midnight on March 1.
What will enumerators ask?
Reports on the questionnaire indicate around 40 questions during the door-to-door visit. Alongside the usual details on age, education, occupation and migration, the new census will record caste beyond the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes for the first time since independence, along with religion. Other new items reported include the birthplace and date of birth of parents and the number of bank accounts in the household.
All information given to enumerators is confidential under the Census Act, 1948. Earlier this month, the Registrar General also told states and Union Territories not to release census data or population figures to the media on their own, underlining that only official, compiled results will be published.
What it means for you
For ordinary families, the census is a short interview, but the numbers it produces shape decades of policy. The caste data in particular is expected to feed into debates on reservation and welfare targeting, while the overall count will eventually be used for fresh delimitation of constituencies. Getting your household counted accurately, whether online or at the door, is the simplest way to make sure your area's needs show up in the data.
Residents of the excluded states and areas should watch for separate notifications. Everyone else can mark January 10 on the calendar, when the self-enumeration window opens.
What happens next
Enumerator training and the launch of the self-enumeration portal are the next big steps before January. The government will also need to notify dates for Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa, Ladakh and the snow-bound regions, and eventually for Manipur. Provisional population totals are expected only after the revisional round in March 2027 is complete.
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