New Delhi: As the new Narendra Modi government settles down in office, it has its task cut out. Besides the National Register of Citizens (NRC), delimitation of electoral constituencies seems high on the priority list of new Union home minister Amit Shah who has prioritised the exercise in troubled Jammu and Kashmir and is reported to be keen to take it up urgently in other states.
A detailed presentation on the situation in J&K, where the BJP has been pushing for carrying out a delimitation exercise, has already been presented to Mr Shah, sources said.
The home minister was briefed about the ground situation in the militancy-hit sate where no delimitation has taken place for the past 16 years.
In 2002, the then state government led by Farooq Abdullah had amended the state constitution that froze the delimitation commission till 2026.
The main task of a delimitation commission is to redraw boundaries of Assembly and Lok Sabha constituencies based on the census to reflect changes in population groupings.
The BJP unit in J&K welcomed the reported discussions at the Centre on delimitation of constituencies in the state as a long-pending constitutional demand and said that Kashmir-based parties had been opposing the exercise just to maintain their grip on the power structure in the state. As of now, the Kashmir region has 46 seats followed by Jammu region with 37 and Ladakh with four.
Sources revealed that the Central government was also looking at other states. West Bengal reportedly is also high on the list for delimitation exercise.
