The Union government on March 6 constituted a Delimitation Commission, to be headed by former Supreme Court judge Ranjana Prakash Desai, to redraw Lok Sabha and Assembly constituencies of the Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir and the Northeastern states of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland, a law ministry notification said.

Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra and the state election commissioners of Jammu & Kashmir and the four states will be the ex-officio members, it said.

What is delimitation?

Delimitation is the process of fixing limits or boundaries of territorial constituencies in a country or a province with a legislative body.

The job of delimitation is assigned to a high-powered body. Such a body is known as the Delimitation Commission or a Boundary Commission.

In India, such Delimitation Commissions have been constituted four times - in 1952 under the Delimitation Commission Act, 1952; in 1963 under the Delimitation Commission Act, 1962; in 1973 under Delimitation Act, 1972; and in 2002 under Delimitation Act, 2002.

The Delimitation Commission in India is a high-powered body whose orders have the force of law and cannot be called into question before any court.

These orders come into force on a date to be specified by the President. The copies of its orders are laid before the Lok Sabha and the state legislative Assembly concerned, but no modifications are permissible therein by them.

Why is exercise being carried out now?

A Delimitation Commission was set up under the Delimitation Act, 2002, to readjust the division of each state and Union Territory into territorial constituencies for the purpose of the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections on the basis of the 2001 Census figures.

The commission completed the delimitation exercise and the Delimitation Order, 2008, in respect of all the states, except four states in the Northeast.

On February 28, the government had cancelled its earlier notifications, which deferred delimitation in Assam, Nagaland, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh due to security issues, saying the exercise could be carried out now as the previous circumstances cease to exist.

The cancelation of the notifications had paved the way for delimitation in the four states.

The commission will delimit the constituencies of Jammu & Kashmir in accordance with the provisions of the Jammu & Kashmir Reorganisation Act, and of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland in accordance with the provisions of the Delimitation Act, 2002, the notification said.

The appointment of Justice (retd) Desai will be for a period of one year or till further orders, whichever is earlier, the notification said.

According to Section 60 of the Jammu & Kashmir Reorganisation Act, “the number of seats in the Legislative Assembly of Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir shall be increased from 107 to 114”.

Out of these, 24 seats are in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. So effectively, the seats will go up from 83 to 90, according to Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora.

The Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir came into being on October 31, 2019 after the state was reorganised and bifurcated into two Union Territories - Ladakh being the other.

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