Supreme Court dismisses challenge to delimitation of assembly, parliamentary seats in J&K.
The top court added its decision on delimitation won’t have a bearing on a separate batch of matters where abrogation of Article 370 is under challenge before a Constitution bench.
A bench of justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and AS Oka said, “Nothing in this judgment shall be construed as giving imprimatur to the exercise of powers under Article 370.” The scrapping of Article 370 giving special status to J&K and bifurcation of J&K into separate union territories of J&K and Ladakh are under challenge before the Supreme Court in separate proceedings.
The bench said, “We have given the rider that the issue of Reorganisation Act is pending before this Court and we have not said anything on the merits of the same. Otherwise petition is dismissed.”
In December, the Modi government had told the Supreme Court that the delimitation exercise for the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir could not wait till 2026 as the idea was to give immediate democracy in the region.
On May 5 last year, the three-member delimitation commission had finalised the UT’s new electoral map, earmarking 43 seats to Hindu-majority Jammu and 47 to Muslim-majority Kashmir. Thus, the strength of J&K Assembly was raised from 83 to 90.