NEW DELHI: The chief ministers of two southern states on Tuesday rejected the government’s move to introduce three bills to provide 33% reservation for women in Parliament and state legislatures, raise the limit of seats in the Lok Sabha to 850 and set up a delimitation commission, with the Congress and other opposition parties raising several key questions about the proposal, including its timing and intent.
Some, including the Congress, have raised concerns about the timing of the bills to be brought up in the three-day special session of Parliament starting on Thursday – even as the Assembly elections are underway. Others expressed reservations about the possibility that the 2011 census would form the basis of the border demarcation process. To be sure, no party has officially declared its position on this issue yet.
Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal accused the BJP of using women’s reservation as a “political tool” to secure a numerical advantage in the 2029 Lok Sabha elections.
“The BJP does nothing unless it knows there is a political advantage,” Sibal said.
He said that if the government was “really concerned about reservation for women”, it would give reservation to 33% of the current 543 seats immediately instead of linking it to a controversial delimitation process. Sibal warned that using his “veto power” to redraw electoral district boundaries is a strategic move “to ensure that the declining graph does not reach rock bottom.”
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Outlining the Congress’s stand, party chief Mallikarjun Kharge wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday, urging him to convene an all-party meeting on the issue, and alleged that the special session was called without taking the opposition into confidence.
Party general secretary KC Venugopal questioned the “extreme urgency” in bringing the crucial legislation. “Under the guise of bringing up women’s reservations, the BJP is looking to bulldoze the flawed, unconstitutional and anti-federal delimitation process. What is the rush to introduce this with little notice? When two key states are heading to elections, holding a special session for this shows the true deceitful intentions of this fascist regime,” he said on X.
India Bloc voters are likely to hold a meeting in New Delhi on Wednesday. Even the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam Congress and the Trinamool Congress are likely to attend, despite the ongoing assembly elections in Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, people familiar with the matter said.
The Chief Ministers of Tamil Nadu and Telangana attacked the Center over the proposed delimitation as the bill shared by the government did not ensure that the existing seat ratios were maintained.
The Chief Minister of TN, M. K. Stalin, threatened to create massive disturbances that would bring the state to a standstill if anything was done to the detriment of the state or if the political power of the northern states was disproportionately increased in demarcation of boundaries. “We do not even know how this demarcation process will be implemented. No explanation has been given so far regarding the proposed constitutional amendment,” Stalin said.
“If Tamil Nadu is affected, we will make the entire nation take notice. I repeat, Chief Minister, this is the last warning issued to you by Tamil Nadu. Tamil Nadu will fight, Tamil Nadu will win,” he said.
Telangana Chief Minister Revanth Reddy has issued a formal appeal to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his fellow SMC members to reject pure demographic expansion of Lok Sabha seats.
In an open letter sent on Tuesday, Reddy warned that a “proportional” increase to 850 seats would penalize states for successful population control, and instead suggested a “hybrid model” that rewards economic contribution and development performance.
“Over the past several decades, the southern states of Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Puducherry and Kerala have adopted policies aimed at achieving population stability, improving public health, and achieving higher human development outcomes. These efforts have been made in line with national priorities and have contributed significantly to India’s overall progress,” he said.
Reddy proposed a “hybrid model” to increase Lok Sabha seats, where 50% of the additional seats would be allocated on a proportional basis, while the remaining 50% would be allocated on the basis of the state’s GDP and other performance criteria.
Communist Party of India (Marxist) representative John Brittas said that the bills amounted to a death warrant for federalism in India.
“The bills being introduced in the name of implementing the Women’s Reservation Act amount to a death sentence in federal India. The accompanying delimitation bill, which was introduced as part of this exercise, would strip the southern states – which have successfully implemented population control measures – of their legitimate political power,” he said.
However, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said there was an attempt to “mislead” the southern states that they would lose out in delimitation as they adhere to population determination criteria.
“If you review the entire provisions of the bill, you will find that every state, region and community has been taken care of…there is nothing to worry about. In the past some people tried to mislead that the southern states would lose because of their success in family planning. In fact, these southern states are lucky because even though population growth and a proportionately smaller population are controlled, they still gain,” he told reporters.
