India, May 2 -- Although all political parties have welcomed the central government's resolve to include a caste census as part of the national census, experts and officials are citing the upheaval over caste-based quotas that Maharashtra has been witnessing over the last decade and have expressed apprehensions about the potential unrest within and between communities once the micro-level data is revealed.

Petitioners fighting for Maratha reservation and those arrayed it said the caste census would open a Pandora's Box. Their contention is that it will not help weed out backwardness with the aid of reservation, as there is no room for more of the latter. At the same time, they maintain that reducing the existing quota on the basis of pop...