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Delimitation changes poll equation in Delhi

NEW DELHI: With the Union Cabinet giving its nod for implementation of the Delimitation Commission’s recommendations on redefining Parliamentary and State Assembly constituencies and the next Assembly elections in Delhi now expected to be held as per the new format, the political domains and equations in the Capital are expected to change drastically.

As almost all the Assembly constituencies would now undergo some change with a few due to ‘disappear’ and make way for new ones, almost all politicians are busy trying to identify which constituency would be best suited for them and which can be nurtured as standbys should they not get the ticket from their preferred choice.

Also, the exercise has led to a situation where some politicians will have to look for new constituencies either because of change in reservation status or due to their being cut altogether. While Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit’s Gole Market would now cease to exist, her arch political rival and Ghonda MLA Bhisham Sharma will also have to contend with the deletion of his constituency.

In the case of Gole Market, it would now pave the way for the New Delhi Assembly segment that would retain Sarojini Nagar but lose Chanakyapuri to Delhi Cantonment segment.

There are also many MLAs who believe that the exercise will go in their favour as it would allow them to retain hold of key areas in their constituencies while placing the remaining areas in other Assembly segments. Badarpur constituency, which will have the highest number of voters, will be one such constituency that will lose several of its areas to Okhla and this is expected to benefit area MLA Ramvir Singh Bidhuri of Nationalist Congress Party as it would do away with much of the anti-incumbency factor which he would have otherwise faced.

While the delimitation has put almost all the politicians into uncharted territory as now everybody has a slightly altered Assembly segment to deal with, some had felt threatened by the exercise.

Delhi Deputy Speaker and Matia Mahal MLA Shoaib Iqbal had even moved the Delhi High Court to challenge the delimitation exercise carried out by the Delimitation Commission in Delhi on the ground that such power be vested with the Election Commission.

0The court had, however, held that both the Delimitation Commission and the Election Commission were empowered to carry out the exercise of delimitation on the ground that the Delimitation Commission undertakes the exercise of readjusting the constituencies from time to time as a result of the change in the demographic pattern, whereas the Election Commission under the NCT Act is required to perform only a single time exercise for distributing the seats assigned to the legislative assembly by maintaining the delimitation orders up to date. Therefore, there was no conflict between their powers.

On the other hand BJP MLA from Saket Vijay Jolly had moved the Supreme Court in December 2007 seeking the court’s direction to the Union Home Ministry to place the Delimitation Commission’s report before President Pratibha Patil for her approval and have the presidential notification issued to pave the way for holding the next Lok Sabha and assembly elections on the basis of the recast constituencies.

He had contended that the government was dithering on implementing the report despite the fact that the Commission, headed by former Justice Kuldeep Singh, has already completed its statutory duty of recasting and readjusting the boundaries of assembly and parliamentary constituencies on the basis of the 2001 census.

One key aspect of the report of the Delimitation Commission is that it has reduced the number of reserved constituencies in Delhi from 14 to 12.

As per the Delimitation Commission report, now each of the seven Lok Sabha constituencies in Delhi will have an average of 19.78 lakh voters and each of the 10 Assembly constituencies therein an average of 1.97 lakh voters.

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