---
license: cc-by-4.0
language:
- en
tags:
- india
- census
- demographics
- districts
- population
- literacy
pretty_name: India Census 2011 - District Level
size_categories:
- n<1K
---

# India Census 2011 — District Level

Clean, versioned district-level data from India's 2011 Census. 
640 districts. 29 columns. Zero missing values. Ready for pandas.

## Quick Start

```python
import pandas as pd
from huggingface_hub import hf_hub_download

path = hf_hub_download(
    repo_id="indiaset/census-2011",
    filename="census_2011_districts_final.parquet",
    repo_type="dataset"
)
df = pd.read_parquet(path)
print(df.shape)  # (640, 29)
```

## What's In This Dataset

One row per district. All 640 districts of India as they existed 
on Census night — midnight of February 28, 2011.

| Column | Description |
|--------|-------------|
| state_code | Census 2011 state code |
| state_name | Official state/UT name |
| district_code | Census 2011 district code |
| district_name | District name as per Census |
| lgd_code | LGD permanent district code |
| district_name_lgd | District name as per LGD |
| pop_total | Total population |
| pop_male | Male population |
| pop_female | Female population |
| pop_under6_total | Children under 6 years |
| pop_sc | Scheduled Caste population |
| pop_st | Scheduled Tribe population |
| literate_total | Literate persons |
| literate_male | Literate males |
| literate_female | Literate females |
| illiterate_total | Illiterate persons |
| workers_total | Total workers |
| workers_male | Male workers |
| workers_female | Female workers |
| non_workers_total | Non workers |
| literacy_rate | Literate / Total × 100 |
| sex_ratio | Females per 1000 males |
| workforce_participation | Workers / Total × 100 |

## Validation

District populations sum to exactly **1,210,854,977** — 
the official Census 2011 total for India. Zero discrepancy.

## Key Insights

- Most literate district: Pathanamthitta, Kerala — 88.74%
- Least literate district: Alirajpur, Madhya Pradesh — 28.77%
- Literacy gap across India: 60 percentage points
- National sex ratio: 943 females per 1000 males

## Known Limitations

⚠️ This data reflects 2011 boundaries. Key things to know:

- **Telangana does not exist** — it was carved out of Andhra 
  Pradesh in 2014. All Telangana districts appear under 
  Andhra Pradesh here.
- **New districts created after 2011 are not present** — 
  India had 640 districts in 2011, now has 800+.
- **Population figures are from 2011** — use for structural 
  comparisons, not current headcounts.
- **Yanam and Mahe** (Puducherry enclaves) LGD codes were 
  manually verified and patched — not in the LGD export.

## Source & License

- **Maintainer:** Ansuman Jaiswal (github.com/iam-ansuman)
- **Source:** Office of the Registrar General & Census 
  Commissioner, India (censusindia.gov.in)
- **LGD Codes:** Ministry of Panchayati Raj, Government of 
  India (lgdirectory.gov.in)
- **Original license:** GODL-India
- **This dataset:** CC-BY-4.0

If you use this dataset, please cite:

Jaiswal, Ansuman. (2026). India Census 2011 - District Level 
[Dataset]. indiaset. Hugging Face. 
https://huggingface.co/datasets/indiaset/census-2011

## Cleaning Pipeline

Full reproducible pipeline available at:
github.com/indiaset/census-2011-pipeline