Assembly seats may also rise significantly
Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, Apr 16: New Delhi and Jammu and Kashmir, which are among the eight UTs in the country, are going to get lion’s share of 16 Lok Sabha seats proposed to be increased for the UTs if the Women’s Reservation and Delimitation bills are passed by the Parliament. The bills, moved by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, are currently under discussion in Lok Sabha and will be taken up for voting tomorrow.
Follow the Daily Excelsior channel on WhatsApp
The Government proposes to increase seats of the UTs from present 19 to 35.
Presently, Delhi has highest number of seven Lok Sabha seats followed by Jammu and Kashmir five and Dadra & Nagar Haveli and Daman & Diu two. Other UTs including Ladakh, Chandigarh, Lakshadweep, Puducherry and Andaman & Nicobar Islands have one Lok Sabha seat each.
Delhi, Jammu and Kashmir and Puducherry are the only UTs with Legislature having 70, 90 and 30 Assembly seats. However, Delhi with 70 seats has seven Lok Sabha seats while Jammu and Kashmir with 90 segments have five Lok Sabha constituencies.
Population and voters are very low in six UTs, excepting Jammu and Kashmir and Delhi, which together accounted for seven Lok Sabha seats and even if the Delimitation Commission decides to increase one seat each there; it will still leave 10 Lok Sabha seats for Delhi and Jammu and Kashmir. However, as per political observers some of the small UTs may not be eligible for increase of even one seat going by the population, which will leave 12 or even 13 seats for the UTs of J&K and Delhi.
Jammu and Kashmir being the hilly State can have 9-10 Lok Sabha seats subject to approval of the bill by the Parliament from present five which include Udhampur-Doda-Kathua, Jammu-Reasi, Anantnag-Poonch-Rajouri, Srinagar and Baramulla, making it two and half seats each for both Jammu and Kashmir divisions.
However, whatever be the number of total Lok Sabha seats fixed by the Delimitation Commission for Jammu and Kashmir, 33 percent of them will be reserved for women.
J&K Assembly is among those States and UTs which will have next elections based on 33 percent reservation for women. The Government proposes that Lok Sabha elections in 2029 followed by Assembly polls thereafter will be held with increased seats with one-third of them reserved for women.
While Lok Sabha elections are due in April-May, 2029; the Assembly polls in Jammu and Kashmir are scheduled for September-October in the same year. In view of this, next Assembly elections in J&K are likely to see increased number of seats and reservation for women.
If the formula for 50 percent increase in Lok Sabha seats is adopted in the Assemblies, Jammu and Kashmir can have 135 seats with 44 or 45 of them reserved for women.
In addition, the Centre also plans to increase number of nominated MLAs in J&K House from present five to seven including three seats each for women and Kashmiri migrants and one Pakistan occupied Jammu Kashmir refugee.
Presently, there is a provision for nomination of five MLAs in the Assembly including two women, two Kashmiri migrants, one of them also a woman, and one refugee from PoJK. However, even after one and a half years of the Legislative Assembly, the nominations haven’t been made. The nominations have been challenged by the Congress in the court of law though the Competent Authority hasn’t been restrained from nominations.
The number of directly elected seats in the UT of Jammu and Kashmir cannot be less than 114 including 24 seats reserved for Pakistan-occupied Jammu & Kashmir (PoJK) which means that the number of directly elected seats cannot be less than the existing 90.
Significantly, no restrictions have been placed on the proposed Delimitation Commission unlike the post-2019 delimitation, when the number of seats was already fixed in the Jammu & Kashmir Reorganization Act at 114 including 90 for existing Assembly and 24 reserved for PoJK.
Follow our WhatsApp channel
