Delimitation Exercise

Why in News?

Home Minister recently asserted that delimitation will not lose any Parliamentary seat to the Southern states.

Constitutional provisions

Election Commission defines delimitation as the process of drawing constituency boundaries for elected bodies based on the population in the most recent Census.
Article 82 - It states that after every Census is completed, the allocation of Lok Sabha seats to each state must be adjusted based on population changes.
Article 81 – It states there can be no more than 550 members in the Lok Sabha, 530 from states and 20 from Union Territories.
It also says that the ratio between (the number of seats) and the population of the state is, so far as practicable, the same for all states.
So, each constituency across the country should ideally have the same population.
Purpose - The main purpose of undertaking the delimitation exercise is to rationalize the structure and composition of the electoral constituencies.
It adheres to the principle of One Vote One value to provide representation to different sections of the population and remove gross inequalities in the population size of constituencies.
Delimitation has taken place 4 times - 1952, 1963, 1973 and 2002, with the number of seats fixed and readjusted during the first 3 exercises.

Related Amendments

In 1976, the 42^nd Amendment to the Constitution froze the number of Lok Sabha seats and put off delimitation for 25 years until the 2001 Census under Article 82.
84^th Amendment further delayed delimitation for another 25 years.
Delimitation is expected to be held after the new Census exercise, which is much-delayed.
As per the delimitation calendar set earlier, this was to happen by 2026.

Delimitation Commission

The Constitution has provided for an independent Delimitation Commission every decade to reapportion seats among states.
The Commission is appointed by the President of India.
It comprises
- A retired judge of the Supreme Court or a high court,
- The Chief Election Commissioner, and
- The State Election Commissioner.
The Commission examines the changes in the population to redraw the constituencies or redraw a new one where it is necessary.
The draft report is published in the Gazette of India which is open for public feedback.
The final report is published after accounting for the public feedback.
Once published, the Commission’s orders are final and, as per the Delimitation Commission Act 1952 and Article 329A of the Constitution.

Reference

India Today | Delimitation