Memorandums submitted to Commission
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, July 7: Various organizations have demanded that the delimitation process in the J&K should be fair and justifiable.
People’s Democratic Front (PDF) has urged the Delimitation Commission to make population that too as per 2011 census but not geographical area as the basic criteria for delimiting and rewarding Assembly constituencies in Jammu and Kashmir UT in its ongoing delimitation exercise.
PDF in a handout issued here, today has made it clear that any proposal or formula for delimitation of Assembly constituencies aimed at disempowering any particular region was totally unacceptable to the party. In a written memorandum submitted to chairperson of Delimitation Commission, Justice (retd) Ranjana Prakash Desai a four member delegation of PDF has exuded confidence that the Delimitation Commission would work towards reducing the trust deficit created due to bifurcation and downgrading of the erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir State into two UTs.
Pirpanchal Senior Citizens Forum in its memorandum to Delimitation Commission has demanded a separate seat of Parliament be carved out to provide effective representation to the people of this war battered region in Lok Sabha, at least two more Assembly seats one for each Rajouri and Poonch districts be created to provide easy access and effective representation to the people of the region and the secular fabric of the region be kept in tact while carrying out delimitation process.
The J&K Delimitation Forum convener, Muker Jeet Sharma in its memorandum to the Commission said that there is a general feeling among the people of Jammu and rightly so that the delimitation in the erstwhile State has never been done fairly and transparently and always remained politically motivated and there is difference of seven seats in spite of the fact that the number of voters are almost same and Jammu is having larger area than Kashmir with more geographically disadvantage area. As State having special status was empowered to constitute its own Delimitation Commission which gave political leverage to Kashmir over Jammu which resulted in many discrepancies with Jammuites along with large scale change in demography of Jammu city and its surroundings.
The Forum expressed the hope that in present delimitation Jammu region will get its due share this time and the discrepancies thus created over the years will end to set a balance between the two regions.
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