Sign In
Learn bits
Polity & Governance
Mahesh

01/01/23 19:34 PM IST

Election Commission begins delimitation of constituencies in Assam

In News
  • The Election Commission recently said it has started the delimitation process of Assembly and parliamentary constituencies in Assam.
  • Census data of 2001 will be used for the process.
About Delimitation
  • Delimitation is the act of redrawing boundaries of Lok Sabha and state Assembly seats to represent changes in population.
  • The main objective of delimitation is to provide equal representation to equal segments of a population.
  • For instance, in 1971, Assam’s population was 1.46 crore. In 2001, it increased to 2.66 crores.
  • Further, the population does not grow uniformly across all areas of a state.
  • Hence, delimitation of constituencies is periodically carried out to reflect not only an increase in population but changes in its distribution.
Composition
  • Delimitation is carried out by an independent Delimitation Commission, appointed by the Government of India under provisions of the Delimitation Commission Act.
  • The Delimitation Commission is appointed by the President of India and works in collaboration with the Election Commission of India.
  • It is composed of the following: a retired Supreme Court judge, the Chief Election Commissioner of India and respective State Election Commissioners.
  • The Delimitation Commission is to work without any executive influence.
  • The Constitution mandates that the Commission’s orders are final and cannot be questioned before any court as it would hold up an election indefinitely.
How is delimitation supposed to be carried out?
  • Under Article 82, Parliament is to enact a Delimitation Act after every Census.
  • Once the Act is in force, the Union government sets up the Delimitation Commission.
  • The Commission is supposed to determine the number and boundaries of constituencies in a way that the population of all seats, so far as practicable, is the same.
  • The Commission is also tasked with identifying seats reserved for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.
  • The final order is published in the Gazette of India and the State Gazette concerned and comes into force on a date specified by the President.
Historical Background
  • In the history of the Indian republic, Delimitation Commissions have been set up four times — 1952, 1963, 1973 and 2002 under the Acts of 1952, 1962, 1972 and 2002.
  • There was no delimitation after the 1981, 1991 and 2001 Censuses.
  • However, the 2002 Act did not make any changes in total Lok Sabha seats or their apportionment between various states.
  • The delimitation exercises was not conducted frequently in the recent past.
  • This is because the Indian Constitution mandates that the number of Lok Sabha seats allocated to a state should be (as far as it is achievable) same for all states.
  • This has an unintended consequence of those states that did not take measures to control the population getting larger number of seats in the Indian Parliament.
  • To address this issue, the Indian Constitution was amended in 1976 to suspend the delimitation until 2001.
  • Another amendment was enacted to delay the delimitation exercise further until 2026, with the hope that India would achieve a uniform population growth rate by this time.
Source- Indian Express

More Related Current Affairs View All

05 Mar

First-ever comprehensive survey of India’s river dolphins

'Prime Minister Narendra Modi released the results of the first-ever comprehensive population estimation of riverine dolphins – Gangetic and Indus dolphins – done in In

Read More

05 Mar

Arresting women at night

'The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court in Deepa versus S. Vijayalakshmi and Others ruled that the legal provision in the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023, which

Read More

05 Mar

Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023

'The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) looking to wrap up public consultations on the draft Rules for the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 by Mar

Read More

India’s First Ai-Driven Magazine Generator

Generate Your Custom Current Affairs Magazine using our AI in just 3 steps