Context

• Recently, a former legal advisor to the Election Commission(EC) has held that the Centre’s order for setting up a Delimitation Commission for Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Assam and Nagaland is “unconstitutional” and “illegal”.

Back to Basics

About Delimitation Commission

• Act of redrawing boundaries of Lok Sabha and Assembly constituencies to represent changes in population and is done on the basis of the preceding Census.
• Appointed by the President of India and works in collaboration with the Election Commission of India.
• Article 82 provides the Parliament to enact a Delimitation Act after every Census.
• Article 170 provides division of State into territorial constituencies as per Delimitation Act after every Census.
• Once the Act enacted by the Parliament is in force, the Union government sets up a Delimitation Commission.
• It is usually composed of the retired Supreme Court judge, Chief Election Commissioner and respective states’ Election Commissioners.
• It determines the number and boundaries of constituencies to make the population of all constituencies nearly equal.
• It also identifies the seats reserved for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, wherever their population is relatively large.

Source: TH & Laxmikanth