Overview
- The government, which opened a three‑day special session on Thursday, introduced three bills to implement one‑third seats for women and to launch a fresh delimitation, and the Lok Sabha cleared their introduction after a division with final voting planned for Friday.
- The Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill proposes a 2011 census‑based delimitation that would lift Lok Sabha strength to as many as 850 seats, with up to 815 for states and up to 35 for Union Territories, to enable the quota by the 2029 elections.
- Delimitation is the process that redraws constituency lines and reallocates seats by population after a census, and opponents say using older 2011 data could skew representation toward faster‑growing northern states.
- Opposition parties in the INDIA bloc said they back the quota but will vote against the delimitation‑linked provisions, arguing the quota should be implemented on the current 543 seats and warning that smaller and southern states could lose clout.
- Southern leaders escalated protests as Tamil Nadu’s M.K. Stalin burned a copy of the bill and Kerala’s Pinarayi Vijayan and Telangana’s A. Revanth Reddy warned of a hit to federal balance, while Home Minister Amit Shah said the census process has begun with caste enumeration and passage still needs a two‑thirds majority.