About 30 per cent of private sector professionals in Telangana belong to the General Castes, while only 5 per cent are Scheduled Tribes (STs), despite their share of total population being similar.
Scheduled Castes and STs are three times more backward than the General Castes, according to Telangana Socio, Economic, Educational, Employment, Political and Caste (SEEEPC) Survey 2024.
In March 2025, the Telangana government constituted a nine-member Independent Expert Working Group (IEWG) to undertake a comprehensive analysis of the SEEEPC Survey, 2024. The IEWG was mandated to verify, analyse, interpret and present the findings of SEEEPC 2024.
Study breakup
As per the key findings, released on Thursday, the backward classes are 2.7x more backward than the General Castes. The weighted average – Composite Backwardness Index (CBI) score – for the entire State is 81. The higher the CBI score, the more backward the caste. It was found that 135 castes out of the total 242 castes have a CBI score above 81. These 135 castes account for 67 per cent of the total population.
These include 69 Backward Classes (BCs), 41 SCs and 25 STs. All the 18 castes that fall under the privileged ‘General Caste’ category – that accounts for 12 per cent of the total population – scored well below the State CBI average, the report said.
Among the 107 castes deemed less backward, there are 64 BCs , 18 SCs, 7 STs and all 18 General Category castes.
“These 107 castes account for 29 per cent of the total population. Of the total population, 99 per cent are STs, 97 per cent SCs and 71 per cent BCs are more backward than the State average,’’ the expert group report said.
Nearly half of SCs in the workforce are daily wage labourers compared to one-tenth of General Caste members.
One-third of ST families live in homes with no toilet or tap water, compared to 5 per cent General Caste households.
Among the more prosperous General Castes, about 62 per cent of Reddys live in rural Telangana compared to 30 per cent of Komatis.
The analysis used self-reported responses of 3.55 crore (35 million) people.
Published on April 16, 2026