Govt calls for increasing seats in State Assembly, Rajya Sabha, Lok Sabha
Chizokho Vero
August 18
KOHIMA (MExN): Leader in the State Legislature Assembly and Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio today moved the House for passing of a resolution calling for exemption of Nagaland from the Delimitation Act 2002. In his address during the first day of the monsoon session, the Chief Minister strongly urged the Union Government to pay heed to the voice of the Naga people as represented in the August House and implement the resolution of the NLA passed in this regard on earlier occasions.
The Chief Minister also urged the Union Government to order a fresh Census for the entire State of Nagaland or at least in those areas where higher growth rates than the State average had been detected.
The government also asked the Union Government to impose a moratorium on all delimitation exercise by suitably exempting Nagaland from the constitutional provision relating to delimitation and thereby from the Delimitation Act, 2002 till the fresh census was concluded and until a political solution acceptable to the Nagas was arrived at. The Chief Minister lamented that the earlier resolutions of the State legislature urging for the exemption of Nagaland from the delimitation exercise remained “unheeded despite the State government’s best efforts”.
The government observed that the security situation in Nagaland was “very delicate” and any attempt to stir up inter-tribal relations by reorganising assembly constituencies would gravely affect the ongoing peace efforts.
Drawing attention to serious anomalies in the population figures for Nagaland, as projected in the 2001 census particularly the steep growth rates in several areas above the State average, the government noted that this had rendered the 2001 census of Nagaland as completely “unreliable for any constitutional exercises including the delimitation of Assembly Constituencies in Nagaland”.
The government also observed that any delimitation of assembly constituencies in Nagaland on the basis of this faulty census of 2001 would lead to aggravation of the existing anomalies. It was also argued that Nagaland enjoyed special status under article 371-A of the Constitution thereby qualifying for the same exemption as had been granted to Jammu & Kashmir.
In another significant development, the State government today moved for increasing the number of seats in the Nagaland Legislative Assembly (NLA) from 60 to 80. It also called for an increase in seats for the Lok Sabha from the present one member to three and for the Rajya Sabha from one to two seats.
Reiterating the earlier resolution passed in the NLA, the Leader of the Legislature, State Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio said that such a step was necessitated keeping in view the emerging proposals for proportionately increasing the number of representatives in Parliament and State legislatures to accommodate 33 per cent reservation for women in the National and State legislatures. Further, the House also urged upon the Centre to enact a law in Parliament at the earliest for creation of a Legislative Council in the State of Nagaland under Article 169 of the Constitution of India.
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