Explained: What south India stands to lose from a population-based delimitation

AS the Union government gears up to introduce bills related to delimitation in the Parliament, politicians from southern India have raised alarm yet again that their states will suffer from reduced representation if the seats are distributed based on the states’ population.

Chief Ministers of all South Indian states, except Andhra Pradesh, have expressed concerns about possible injustice to their states through the impending delimitation exercise. 

The Union government is set to introduce three bills on Thursday, April 16, to expand the Lok Sabha from 543 to 850 seats, redefining the boundaries of Parliamentary constituencies. The bills will also bring into effect the 33% reservation for women in the Lok Sabha and state Assemblies, under the 2023 Women’s Reservation Act. 

While some questions about how the delimitation process will be carried out remain unclear, the three proposed bills do suggest that the government plans to use the 2011 Census as the basis for the next delimitation exercise. The Union government has said that basing delimitation on the upcoming 2027 Census would hugely delay implementation of women’s reservation, justifying the move to base it instead on the “latest published census”, which was in 2011. 

Opposition leaders have accused the BJP of using women’s reservation as a “cover” to bring about unfair delimitation without consultations. 

There is resistance to the bills from all southern states except Andhra Pradesh, as well as West Bengal and Punjab – a culmination of longstanding opposition to redrawing Parliamentary constituencies based on population. Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Telangana, and Punjab have even demanded an extension of the existing delimitation freeze for another 25 years beyond 2026. 

Leaders from these states have argued that they would be left with fewer Lok Sabha seats as a result of having controlled their population effectively, while the Hindi belt states, which have witnessed massive population growth and also happen to be BJP strongholds, will end up with more parliamentarians and disproportionately higher representation in the lower house. 

South India as a whole – Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Lakshadweep, and Puducherry – has seen a population growth of 11.70 crore between 1971 and 2011, according to the Census. Uttar Pradesh alone had its population rise by 11.15 crore in the same period. 

So if delimitation is done solely based on population, based on the 2011 Census or the upcoming 2027 Census, representation can be expected to skew heavily against southern states. 

Last year, Union Minister Amit Shah had responded to these concerns by stating that the south would not suffer in the delimitation exercise, as it would be done on a pro rata basis (retaining the existing percentage share of total seats for each state) and not based on population. He is expected to clarify the exact process when the bills are introduced in the Parliament on April 16. 

Telangana CM Revanth Reddy, however, objected to the pro rata solution as well. In a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he said that increasing Lok Sabha seats on either population or pro rata model was not acceptable, especially to southern states. Instead, he has suggested considering states’ economic contributions and human development outcomes. In the past, Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leader KT Rama Rao too had suggested delimitation based on states’ contribution to the GDP. 

Southern states have been speculating for a while on how population-based delimitation would look based on guesstimates of an expanded Lok Sabha’s strength. Now that the Union government has specified that there will be 850 seats – 815 for states and 35 for Union Territories – here’s what representation in an expanded Lok Sabha may look like, either on a population or pro rata basis. 

Tamil Nadu would lose the most (11) seats if delimitation is based on population, while Uttar Pradesh would gain the most (14). 

The last delimitation of Lok Sabha seats was done in 1976, based on the 1971 Census. 

If seats are redistributed based on the 2011 Census population numbers alone, south India, which currently has a 24.3% share of Lok Sabha seats, will see its share go down to 20.7%. 

UP, Bihar, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Delhi, which are the top five states that would benefit from a 2011 Census-based delimitation, currently have a 33.33% share of Lok Sabha seats. This would go up to 38.35%. 

What do the proposed bills say 

The Constitution (One Hundred and Thirty-first Amendment) Bill, 2026, raises the Lok Sabha’s strength to 850 from 543. Previously, the Constitution had capped the Lok Sabha’s strength to 550 seats. 

The Bill also alters Article 82 of the Constitution, which says that the next delimitation exercise will happen only after the first census taken after 2026 has been published. This would be the upcoming 2027 Census. 

Article 82 also says that after every Census, the Lok Sabha seats allocated to each state and the division of constituencies will be readjusted. However, the redistribution of Lok Sabha seats among states has remained frozen since 1976, and is still based on the 1971 Census. The boundaries of Lok Sabha and Assembly seats within states were last readjusted based on the 2001 Census. 

The Constitution (One Hundred and Thirty-first Amendment) Bill says that the next census and the subsequent delimitation exercise will take a considerable amount of time and would “delay the effective and dedicated participation of women in our democratic polity.”

Former Chief Election Commissioner SY Quraishi had earlier noted that even if the 2027 Census data is published in 2028, delimitation may not be completed before 2031-32.  

The Bill says it intends to operationalise one-third reservation for women in the Lok Sabha and Assemblies “through delimitation exercise to be undertaken on the basis of the population figures of the latest published census.” (2011 Census) 

“[The] implementation of reservation of seats for women is linked to the constitutional scheme of readjustment in the allocation of seats in the House of the People and the Legislative Assemblies and re-drawing boundaries of territorial constituencies by the Delimitation Commission," the Bill says. 

The Delimitation Bill, 2026, on the other hand, says that a Delimitation Commission constituted by the Union government will carry out the exercise. It will comprise a current or former Supreme Court judge appointed by the Union government as the chairperson, along with Chief Election Commissioner or an Election Commissioner nominated by the CEC, and the State Election Commissioner of the state concerned. 

Critics have argued that the law doesn’t sufficiently ensure fairness in the appointment and functioning of this Delimitation Commission. 

Opposition from the southern CMs 

Telangana Chief Minister Revanth Reddy has written to all his counterparts from other south Indian states, urging them to “unite against this onslaught on the political rights and protect our voice in Delhi.” 

Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin said that the special session of the Parliament was being forced on his state and West Bengal in the middle of elections. Alleging that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) would attempt to “bulldoze” its way through the debates on the legislations, he warned of massive protests if constituencies were redrawn in a way that was unfair to Tamil Nadu. 

Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah too warned against the risk of “concentrating power in a few large states, weakening Karnataka and the South, and undermining the federal balance.”

Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan said that the draft Delimitation Bill “seems to suggest that the BJP-led Union Government is keen on proceeding with a delimitation exercise without accounting for the current proportional share of the states vis-à-vis their representation in the Lok Sabha.” He said that such an exercise would be “highly unjust” and penalise the very states “which took conscious efforts to sincerely implement the National Population Policy, 1976.”

While Andhra Pradesh CM Chandrababu Naidu has been vocal about his concerns over declining fertility rate in his state and has announced incentives to boost population growth, the BJP ally has remained silent over delimitation while calling on all parties to support the implementation of women’s reservation.