Farooq-led NC rejects draft
In its draft working paper submitted to five associate members, the Jammu & Kashmir Delimitation Commission has sought to redraw boundaries of five Lok Sabha constituencies of Jammu and Kashmir to make it two and half seats in both divisions.
The commission has put aside objections filed by Farooq Abdullah-led J&K National Conference (JKNC) against the move to give six new Assembly seats to Jammu region as against just one to the Kashmir division. The commission has asked the associate members to submit their objections/suggestions by February 14, after which the report would be put in the public domain.
Meanwhile, taking to Twitter, the JKNC announced that it has rejected the draft paper. “JKNC summarily REJECTS draft working paper made available by Delimitation Commission to associate members. A detailed response will follow after the party has had time to discuss the implications of what has been proposed,” the party said at its Twitter handle.
Top sources said that the draft paper was sent to the five associate members — Farooq Abdullah, Hasnain Masoodi, Akbar Lone (Lok Sabha MPs from the National Conference), Jitendra Singh and Jugal Kishore (BJP MPs) — on Friday evening for their viewpoints /comments by February 14. The report has rejected the objections filed by the National Conference on December 31 last year opposing the proposal to increase six Assembly seats in the Jammu region as against just one in the Kashmir division. Once the delimitation exercise is completed, the number of Assembly seats in J&K will go up from 83 to 90. While 24 seats of the Assembly continue to remain vacant as they fall under Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK).
According to sources, the commission has divided 20 districts of J&K into three categories — ‘A’ with predominantly hill and difficult areas; ‘B’ with hill and flat areas; and ‘C’ with predominantly flat areas — giving a margin of minus or plus 10 per cent of average population per Assembly constituency (1,36,304), while proposing an allocation of constituencies.
Taking into account this average, census population, area, and population density, the panel has proposed 11 seats for Jammu; eight seats for Srinagar; seven seats each for Baramulla and Anantnag; six seats each for Kupwara and Kathua; five seats each for Budgam and Rajouri; four seats each for Pulwama and Udhampur; three seats each for Bandipora, Kulgam, Kishtwar, Doda, Reasi, Samba and Poonch; and two seats each for Ganderbal, Shopian and Ramban.
As per the proposal, the Anantnag Parliamentary seat will include Rajouri and Poonch from the Jammu region. Barring Khanyar, Sonwar, and Hazratbal Assembly seats of Srinagar district, all other seats have been redrawn and merged with proposed new Assembly seats like Channapora and Srinagar South. Many of the Assembly seats in erstwhile Jammu & Kashmir State have vanished. These include Habba Kadal, a seat that was seen as a traditional bastion of migrant Kashmiri pandits.
Similarly, Budgam district, which had five Assembly seats, was redrawn and merged with Baramulla Parliamentary constituency and new Assembly seats like Kunzer in North Kashmir have been carved out. Sangrama seat in North Kashmir has been merged with other Assembly seats. Baramulla has got two new constituencies -- Kunzer and Tangmarg -- while the existing Sangrama constituency has been merged with Tangmarg.
The commission has proposed a new constituency Trehgam in the Kupwara district and added Kralpora tehsil to the Karnah constituency. Similarly, the Shangus constituency has been divided between Anantnag East and Lernoo constituencies in south Kashmir. Chanpora is the new constituency comprising the whole Chanpora tehsil in the Srinagar district
Pulwama, Tral and some areas of Shopian, which formed part of the Anantnag Lok Sabha seat, will now be part of the Srinagar Parliamentary seat.
The Commission headed by retired Supreme Court judge Justice Ranjana Desai with Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra and State Election Commission K K Sharma was set up on March 6, 2020, and was granted an extension of a year on March 6, 2021, which will come to an end next month.
Assembly seats in J&K were earlier delimited in 1963, 1973 and 1995. The last delimitation exercise was conducted in J&K under President’s rule in 1995 by the retired Justice KK Gupta Commission. The next exercise was due in 2005, but in 2002, the then State Government chose to freeze delimitation until 2026. The decision was in line with the pan-India freeze on the delimitation of Lok Sabha constituencies till the first census after 2026.