Govt to hire communications agency to spread word on Census-NPR

New Delhi: The Centre has decided to hire a professional communications agency for “creating a buzz around Census 2021 and National Population Register (NPR) 2020” and bring about a “behaviour change in the mindset of people across states and religions” so they give enumerators accurate information. This is going to be the first such exercise on such a broad scale that the government will conduct ahead of the count, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
The Registrar General of India (RGI) floated a bid document, which ET has seen, to this effect on January 21. The RGI wants to reach out to people at a time when many opposition-ruled states say they will not roll out the NPR or enforce the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).

The key focus for the proposed communications agency is to “create and design awareness and publicity material about Census 2021-NPR and its activities, goals and objectives,” as per the bid document, and effectively deliver the messages on various aspects of census and NPR “to all target audience and stakeholders.”

The publicity exercise will take place against the backdrop of protests against the Citizen Amendment Act (CAA) across the country. Critics say that the CAA will be used in conjunction with the National Register of Citizens (NRC) that may follow the NPR to discriminate against Muslims. The government has denied this.

The campaign will be run in English, Hindi and 16 regional languages on TV, radio, billboards and through phone text messages. Five celebrity endorsers will be selected, apart from video and audio spots and documentaries being produced on census-NPR themes for a “360-degree media campaign”.

The idea is to “bring about a behaviour change in the mindset of people across states, religions and communities regarding the benefits of giving correct information to the enumerators by linking it to perspective health, economic productivity, pride and well-being schemes and its implementation,” the bid document says.

A specific focus could be on highlighting the utility of the census in planning and development on issues such as girl children, women’s participation in work and the differently abled, according to the people cited above.

The proposed agency would first be required to “understand the various facets of the census-NPR clearly and build communication around existing interventions and communicate to various target audience in a creative manner and establish credibility of the message,” the bid document says.

The target audience is “each and every citizen of the country with special emphasis on economically marginalised and excluded population with focus on women and children.” It will also be aimed at panchayats and block-level officials who will function as enumerators and charge officers, NGOs, civil society organizations, youth groups, women’s groups, academic institutions and corporate houses.

The government plans to get reputed advertisement agencies on board for the project and use all campaign modes such as mass media, digital and social media as well as street plays and puppet shows to drive home the message.