Guwahati, June 20 (IANS) The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Tuesday published the draft proposal for delimitation of assembly and parliamentary constituencies in Assam.
The commission has invited the suggestions and objections to the draft till July 11.
The ECI team will also visit the state to discuss the draft delimitation with various stakeholders.
“All Assembly and Parliamentary Constituencies in the state are to be delimited on the basis of the 2001 Census as provided in Article 170 and Article 82 of the Constitution. The census figures of 2001, as published by the Census Commissioner have thus alone been considered for this purpose,” the ECI said.
The number of seats in the Legislative Assembly and parliament constituencies has been retained as 126 and 14 respectively.
In the draft proposal, 19 seats in the Assembly have been proposed to be allocated for Scheduled Tribes (STs) out of 126 seats, while two seats are proposed to be allocated for STs out of 14 parliamentary seats in the state.
“Similarly, nine seats in the Legislative Assembly are proposed to be allocated for Scheduled Castes (SCs), while one seat is proposed to be allocated for Scheduled Castes in the Lok Sabha from Assam,” the notification added.
Meanwhile, the SC seats in the Assembly have been increased from eight to nine while the ST seats will increase to 19 from present 16 seats, according to the draft.
The Bodoland districts will have three more seats in the next assembly election if the draft is accepted for the delimitation. A new parliamentary seat will be named as Kaziranga.
Meanwhile, the Commission comprising of Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar along with Election Commissioners Anup Chandra Pandey and Arun Goel is slated to visit Assam in July for a public hearing on the draft proposal.
Earlier in March, an ECI team visited Assam and received representations from 11 political parties and 71 organisations.
–IANS
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