The Centre has appointed senior IAS officer Amit Sharma as Director of Census Operations and Citizen Registration for the Union territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, a government order said Wednesday.
Sharma, the 2012-batch IAS officer from AGMUT cadre, has been appointed with effect from November 24 to December 31 or until further orders, said the order issued by the Union Home Ministry.
“The President is pleased to appoint Shri Amit Sharma, an officer belonging to AGMUT Cadre of Indian Administrative Service, as Director of Census Operations/Director of Citizen Registration, Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh with effect from 24.11.2025 for a period up to 31.12.2025 or until further orders, whichever is earlier, on central deputation under the Central Staffing Scheme,” it said.
Sharma will be based in Srinagar, it said.
The Census 2027 will be conducted in two phases. In phase one, House Listing and Housing Census will be done from April to September, 2026 in a period of 30 days as per the convenience of the state and UT governments. In second phase, population enumeration will be done in February 2027 with reference date 00:00 hours of March 1, 2027.
For Ladakh and snow-bound non-synchronous areas of J&K, it will be done in September, 2026 with reference date 00.00 hours of October 1, 2026.
The Census is being carried out after a gap of 16 years as the last one was held in 2011. Over 30 lakh enumerators and their supervisors are likely to be engaged to carry out the mega exercise.
All preparations for the first phase of the Census to be conducted in 2021 were completed and the fieldwork was scheduled to begin in some States/UTs from April 1, 2020. However, due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic across the country, the census work was postponed.