E-Paper
EC's Delimitation Commission to visit Jammu and Kashmir on July 6
The Commission met in Delhi on Wednesday to decide when to hold an all-party meeting with national and local political units with nearly nine months left to complete the exercise, as Jammu and Kashmir gears up for its first assembly election since it became a Union territory, officials said.
Ramping up efforts to hold elections in Jammu and Kashmir, the Delimitation Commission is set to visit the Union territory from July 6 to July 9 to interact with all stakeholders, including political parties, government officials, and public representatives, officials said on Wednesday.
The exercise will be carried out by the commission to gather first-hand information and input concerning the ongoing process of delimitation as mandated under the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, officials said.
The Commission met in Delhi on Wednesday to decide when to hold an all-party meeting with national and local political units with nearly nine months left to complete the exercise, as Jammu and Kashmir gears up for its first assembly election since it became a Union territory, people familiar with the matter said on Saturday. The meet was chaired by delimitation commission chairperson Justice (retd) Ranjana Prakash Desai and Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sushil Chandra, a statement by the DC said.
“The commission will meet on Wednesday to decide a time to have an all-party meeting, including the local parties in Jammu and Kashmir,” a person familiar with the development said last week.
The Delimitation Commission was constituted in March last year and its term was extended by another year in March 2021 due to the ongoing pandemic.
Tasked with drawing out constituencies for the polls, in a first, the commission will also carve constituencies for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes for the first time in the erstwhile state. The primary aim will be to create constituencies on the basis of “physical features, existing boundaries of administrative units, facilities of communication and public convenience”.
Initiating one of the preliminary steps, the commission will discuss allocation of seven new constituencies it will add to the J&K Union territory, pushing the total count of constituencies to 114. The commission will also focus on allocating areas for 90 constituencies in the Union territory. This exercise will not include the other 24 which are a part of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
Carried out 27 years ago, Jammu and Kashmir last witnessed restructuring of its assembly boundaries in the year 1995, based on the 1981 census when the erstwhile state was governed under the Jammu and Kashmir Constitution and Jammu and Kashmir Representation of the People Act, 1957, until its special status was revoked. After the 2001 census, the J&K assembly passed a law putting delimitation on hold until 2026.
