Supreme Court Issues Notice In Plea Seeking To Conduct Delimitation In 4 North Eastern States

The bench of Justices KM Joseph and Hrishikesh Roy while seeking response from Centre, Ministry of Law and Justice and Chief Election Commissioner also granted the petitioners liberty to serve the standing counsel of the north eastern states.

Appearing for the petitioners, Senior Advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan referred to the Presidential's order dated February 28, 2020 that allowed for conducting delimitation exercise in the 4 NE states. He further contended that although the Government of India by a notification issued on March 6, 2020 had constituted a Delimitation Commission for the purpose of delimitation of Assembly and Parliamentary Constituencies in the UT of Jammu and Kashmir and the states of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland and appointed retired Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai as the Chairperson but exercise was only restricted to Jammu and Kashmir. Relying on the order, he argued that the petitioner(s) had submitted memorandum to the Prime Minister of India for the implementation of the Delimitation Act, 2002 in these four states in 2021 and 2022 but has not received any response.

It was stated in the plea that selectively denying delimitation while the same exercise was being conducted in the rest of India violated the fundamental right under article 14 of the Constitution.

The petition further stated that,

"It has been already two decades since the Delimitation Act, 2002 was amended and no delimitation exercises have been conducted in the four North-eastern states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur and Nagaland nor under Section 8A of the Representation of Peoples Act in the name of law-and-order problems. However, since 2002 it is to be noted that various parliamentary and state assembly elections have been conducted successfully in these four North Eastern states without any issue of law-and-order problems. In all fairness these four North- eastern states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur and Nagaland deserved equal treatment per-se with rest of India and delimitation exercise ought be conducted at the earliest either by constituting a commission under the Delimitation Act, 2002 or through the Election Commission under Section 8A
of Representation of Peoples Act as there are no justifiable reason that exist for not conducting delimitation."

The petition has been drafted by Advocate Gaichangpou Gangmei.

Case Title: Delimitation Demand Committee for the State of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur & Nagaland in North East India v Union of India| Diary No 12880 of 2022