‘Have more kids’: Stalin raises concerns over delimitation
Stalin expressed concern that the so-called delimitation exercise scheduled for 2026 could see Tamil Nadu’s relative representation in the Lok Sabha reduce
Tamil Nadu chief minister MK Stalin on Monday asked people in his state to have more children, expressing concern that the so-called delimitation exercise scheduled for 2026 could see Tamil Nadu’s relative representation in the Lok Sabha reduce.
Stalin’s comments come shortly after Andhra Pradesh chief minister and Bharatiya Janata Party ally N Chandrababu Naidu asked people in his state to have more children, although his comments were not motivated by the delimitation exercise, but the state’s aging population.
The basis for both comments is data that shows that the southern states have already seen their fertility rates dip below the replacement level (which ensures the population stays the same), indicating a declining (and ageing) population. The fertility rate for Tamil Nadu is 1.76, Andhra Pradesh 1.68. It is, at 2.35, higher than the replacement level of 2.1 in states such as Uttar Pradesh.
To be sure, the delimitation exercise referred to by Stalin, ensuring that there is a correlation between population and representation, can happen only after the much-delayed (and yet to start) 2021 Census. Indeed, it is quite likely that the government could club this exercise along with that of reserving a third of the seats in the Lok Sabha and state legislatures for women. However, because southern states such as Tamil Nadu have been far more effective in population control, a plain-vanilla delimitation exercise carried out simply on the basis of population could see their relative representation dip.
In 2002, the 84th amendment to the Constitution froze the number of parliamentary seats till the end of 2025. Southern states have long feared that any rejig in the number of seats will benefit the more populous states in northern India and hurt south India’s relative weight in Parliament.
Writing in HT in 2019, political scientists Milan Vaishnav and Jamie Hinston calculated that in 2026, Uttar Pradesh’s Lok Sabha delegation could balloon from 80 to 143, while Kerala’s would remain unchanged at 20, and Tamil Nadu’s would grow from 39 to 49. The Lok Sabha”s overall strength in this scenario will increase to 848.
This is not the first time Stalin is raising this issue. Last year, he mentioned it soon after the Women’s Reservation bill was passed.
On Monday, he was speaking at a wedding organised for 31 couples by the Hindi Religious and Charitable Endowments (HR&CE) department at a temple in Chennai.
Quoting a popular old Tamil saying “pathinaarum petru peru vazhvu vaazhga” which loosely translates as being blessed with 16 kinds of wealth and living prosperously, Stalin said that the number 16 never meant children but riches in life .
“These days, we don’t wish anyone that they should be blessed with 16 kinds of wealth in life,” Stalin said. “We only bless people to live happily with a small family. But when we are faced with situations like a reduction in the number of Parliament seats, we are made to think why should we have small families?”
Interestingly, on Saturday, Naidu too asked people in his state to have more children, but he spoke only of the dangers of an ageing population (which also means the erosion of India’s famous demographic dividend) and referred to the lower fertility rates in the south.
“We are thinking of providing incentives to families with more children, encouraging couples to have more children,” Naidu had said while flagging off resumption of construction work in state’s capital, Amaravati.
Stalin has been urging the BJP-led union government to postpone the delimitation exercise until all states follow population control measures.
Stalin also moved a resolution in the Tamil Nadu assembly on February 14 demanding that the Union government maintain the “present ratio” of parliament and assembly constituencies in states which were fixed based on the 1971 Census by amending the Constitution. “This august house urges (the Centre) that states like Tamil Nadu should not be penalised for implementing various socio-economic development programmes and welfare schemes for the benefit of the people over the past 50 years,” the resolution read.
