Delimitation: Election Commission of India hears over 645 representations, besides parties

 STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: On the second day of its hearing today, the Election Commission of India (ECI) heard over 645 representations from 13 districts of the state, besides national and state political parties.

The objections were mainly the change of names of constituencies, the lack of population-wise representations, the bringing quite faraway places that are geographically not contiguous together under one constituency, and the reduction in the number of LACs in some districts. Right from xatradhikars, today's representations included political parties, various social organizations, NGOs, GP presidents, and many more.

The representatives from the Botadrava LAC raised the demand for the restoration of Botadrava as the name of the LAC.

According to Rashid Mandal of the Congress, the delimitation was done based on religion, not population. In 2007, the Gauhati High Court delivered a judgement stating that the delimitation exercise should not be based on the 2001 Census data.

AIUDF leader Aminul Haque said that they told the ECI not to conduct the delimitation exercise based on religion.

According to sources, the BJP suggested to the ECI that it restore the existing names of some of the constituencies in the final delimitation.

The Election Commission of India had discussions with the Congress, AAP, CPI-M, BJP, AIUDF, AGP, BPF, Janata Dal (U), NCP, RJD, Raijor Dal, Asom Jatiya Parishad, etc.

On the other hand, the ECI heard representations from Goalpara, Bongaigaon, Barpeta, Nalbari, Sonitpur, Dhubri, Karimganj, Nagaon, etc.

The ECI heard over 270 representations on the first day of the hearing yesterday. The hearing will continue tomorrow. The million-dollar question is: how will the ECI redress the grievances of the stakeholders?

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