NC says unwilling to accept events of August 5, won’t participate in delimitation exercise

Three National Conference MPs, including party president Farooq Abdullah, had on Tuesday been nominated as associate members of the commission which will undertake delimitation in the newly-created union territory of Jammu and Kashmir.

The National Conference on Friday announced that it will not participate in the delimitation exercise to redraw parliamentary and assembly constituencies in Jammu and Kashmir because the party was unwilling to accept the events of August 5 last year when the special status of the erstwhile state was abrogated.

The Union Law Ministry has constituted the delimitation commission headed by Supreme Court judge Ranjana Prakash Desai to redraw Lok Sabha and assembly constituencies of the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir and northeastern states of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland. Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra and election commissioners of J and K and the four states are ex-officio members of the commission.

Three National Conference MPs, including party president Farooq Abdullah, had on Tuesday been nominated as associate members of the commission which will undertake delimitation in the newly-created union territory of Jammu and Kashmir where the number of seats in the legislative assembly is to be increased from 107 to 114, out of which 24 are reserved for Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, meaning in effect the number of assembly seats will go up from 83 to 90.

Rejecting “this process”, the NC said the commission is a product of JK Reorganisation Act 2019, which the party is challenging “in and outside the Hon’ble Supreme Court”. “Participating in the commission would be tantamount to accepting the events of August 5, 2019 which the NC is unwilling to do,” the party said in a statement. It added that besides Abdullah, two other party MPs — Akbar Lone and Hasnain Masoodi — will not participate in the commission.
The party maintained that as per the Constitution of erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir state, “the constituencies of JK were to be delimited in 2026 with the rest of the country. The constituencies in the state were last delimited in the 90s.

“Thereafter an amendment was made in the constitution of JK unanimously passed in the state Assembly in which all the regional parties, Congress and BJP voted for this amendment to go with the delimitation….in 2026. Therefore the constitution of the delimitation commission is unwarranted,” the statement added.

Apart from three NC parliamentarians, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla has nominated 12 other MPs from Jammu and Kashmir, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Manipur as Associate Members to assist the commission. The MPs include two union ministers Kiren Rijiju and Jitendra Singh.