JAMMU: The Central government has appointed senior IAS officer Amit Sharma as Director of Census Operations and Citizen Registration for the Union territories of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh, an official order stated on Wednesday.
Sharma, a 2012-batch IAS officer of the AGMUT cadre, will assume charge from November 24 to December 31, 2025, or until further orders. His appointment has been made under the Central Staffing Scheme on central deputation, according to the order issued by the Union Home Ministry.
“The President is pleased to appoint Shri Amit Sharma, an officer belonging to the AGMUT cadre of the 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,” the notification reads. Sharma will be stationed in Srinagar.
The upcoming Census 2027 will be conducted in two phases. The first phase—House Listing and Housing Census—will be carried out between April and September 2026 over a 30-day window depending on state and UT schedules. The second phase, involving population enumeration, is slated for February 2027 with the reference date of 00:00 hours on March 1, 2027.
In Ladakh and snow-bound non-synchronous areas of J&K, enumeration will instead be held in September 2026 with the reference date fixed at 00:00 hours on October 1, 2026.
This will be India’s first Census in 16 years, as the last full exercise was conducted in 2011. More than 30 lakh enumerators and supervisors are expected to participate in the massive population count.
Preparations for Census 2021 had been completed earlier, with fieldwork scheduled to begin on April 1, 2020. However, the exercise was deferred nationwide due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
