Delimitation Bill 2026 & The Question of Women Reservation | CCAL Explainer

Introduction

On 16^th April 2026, 230 out of 528 participating Lok Sabha members voted against the passing of the Delimitation Bill, 2026 alongside the Constitution (131^st Amendment) Bill, 2026 (“the Amendment Bill, 2026”). Broadly, the two bills proposed the following changes:

First, the maximum strength of the Lok Sabha was sought to be increased from 550 to 850 members;

Second, a fresh delimitation exercise was sought to be conducted based on the most recent figures of the 2011 Census;

And finally, third, once the delimitation exercise was complete, 1/3^rd seats were to be reserved women in the Parliament and State Assemblies.

What Is Delimitation?

Delimitation is the process of drawing up boundaries in a country or a province having a legislative body. Each such boundary forms a ‘constituency’. To ensure fair representation, countries periodically redraw electoral boundaries based on population figures from the census.

How Was Article 81 Amended?

Article 81 of the Constitution provides that the composition of the Lok Sabha shall be determined through a proportional representation of the population. Article 81(3) guarantees that ‘population’ would be as ascertained by the ‘last preceding census of which relevant figures have been published.’ The proviso to Article 81(3), as fixed by the 84^th Amendment Act, 2001, provides that until the Census takes place after 2026, ‘population’ is defined as ‘census of which the relevant figures have been published’.

Article 82 sets out the Census figures that govern this exercise. Until the census after 2026, no readjustment of state-wise seat allocation is necessary, and it must continue to follow the 1971 census figures. Similarly, no readjustment of the intra-state constituency division is necessary and, it must continue to follow the 2001 census figures. Any changes in this ‘census freeze’ must require a constitutional amendment to Article 81 & 82.

The Amendment Bill, 2026 sought to replace Article 81(3), by defining ‘population’ to mean the census, ‘as the Parliament may by law determine’. It further removed Article 82, the machinery by which the Census Freeze actually applied. Consequently, the Delimitation Bill, 2026 provided that the delimitation exercise would take place based on the 2011 census figures, solidifying the effect of the 131^st Amendment Bill.

Why Was The Bill Introduced By The Government?

i.               Giving effect to the Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, 2023.

In 2023, the Parliament passed the Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, 2023 (the Women’s Reservation Act), which provided for women’s reservation in the Parliament and State Assemblies. This implementation was contingent on a future census and subsequent delimitation.

The ‘Statement of Objects & Reasons’ within the Amendment Bill, 2026, expressly link between women’s reservation and delimitation. Further, in the address to the Lok Sabha, the government reasoned that delimitation and women’s reservation were intricately linked. It was imperative to know (i) the true state-wise allocation of seats reserved for women, and (ii) the constituency from which such reservation could be claimed.

For example, after a census, the population of Uttar Pradesh is known. Based on this population distribution, UP is divided into constituencies through the subsequent delimitation exercise, with each Member of Parliament representing one constituency. Which of UP's constituencies are reserved for women depends on the delimitation exercise, which must earmark 33% of the state's seats as women-reserved.

This ‘future census’, however, would not have taken place earlier than 2029, before the next General Elections. To curb the wait between the Women’s Reservation Act and its actual implementation, the government introduced the 2026 bills, allowing for the delimitation exercise to be conducted based on the last published Census of 2011.

ii.              Supplementing the One person, One vote, One value principle.

Another underlying reason behind the introduction was to give effect to the “one person, one vote, one value” principle. The government argued that since Article 81’s provisions froze population figures to that of the 1971 and 2001 census, there was a lack of proportional representation of the population.

For example, in 1971, UP and Tamil Nadu's populations were such that giving UP 80 seats and Tamil Nadu 39 seats roughly matched the “one vote, one value” ratio. By 2011, UP's population had grown much faster than Tamil Nadu's. UP's population (nearly 20 crore) is now proportionally far larger relative to its 80 seats than Tamil Nadu's population (7.2 crore) is relative to its 39 seats.

The arguments herein were centred around representational imbalance, federal fairness as well as expansion of SC/ST representation.

Procedurally, Why Did The Bills Fail?

Procedurally, according to Article 368 of the Constitution, a bill moving a constitutional amendment enlists the following requirements to constitute a special majority:

(a)   A majority of the total membership of the House and,

(b)  A majority of not less than 2/3^rd of the members present and voting.

The Bill received 298 votes in favour, falling short of 54 votes to meet the ‘2/3^rd’ threshold, given that 528 members participated in the vote.

Substantially, Why Did the Bills Fail?  

1.     Lack of link to the Women’s Reservation Act  

The opposition parties reasoned that the linking of census, delimitation and gender quota lacked justification. Had the government been genuinely committed to providing 1/3rd reservation to women in electoral politics, the process could have been simplified by the existing 543-seat framework being utilised to implement the quota, as argued by the opposition. Without prompting the discussion on census, and subsequently delimitation, the seats for women could have been earmarked.

2.     Population politics and proportional representation

Opposition was raised by Southern state parties that the redistribution of parliamentary power would come about due to the new delimitation. The new census data would permanently punish southern states, reducing their proportional representation in the Parliament. The disproportionate effect of population control was thereby reintroduced by the bills. While population increase had been successfully curbed by southern states, this decrease was, in effect, punished by the bills, by which reduced seats in Parliament were the result.

3.     ‘Parliament may, by law, determine’ census to be relied upon

The text of the Constitution amendment provided that the parliament ‘may by law’ determine the census to be relied upon. This implied that a bill introduced by the parliament, determining which census to use and when to conduct delimitation, could be passed by a simple majority.  It was argued that a decision previously locked into the Constitution, requiring a special majority to change, turned into something that could be decided by an ordinary law, passed with only a simple majority.

4.     Increase in the maximum number of seats

Opposition parties also raised concerns about the sharp increase in the Lok Sabha's size, from 550 to 850 seats, and its downstream effects on the balance between the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, the permissible size of the Council of Ministers, and the shrinking opportunity for individual MPs to participate in debates and proceedings.

For Further Reading:

1.     M R Madhavan, ‘Implications of increasing the size of the Lok Sabha’ The Hindu (16 April 2026) https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/implications-of-increasing-the-size-of-the-lok-sabha/article70866451.ece

2.     Anmol Jain, ‘Two Defeats, One Winner’ Verfassungsblog (20 April 2026) https://verfassungsblog.de/two-defeats-one-winner/

3.     Vasudev Devadasan, ‘Reshaping federalism in the name of women: The proposed 131st amendment’ Constitutional Law and Philosophy (15 April 2026) https://indconlawphil.wordpress.com/2026/04/15/reshaping-federalism-in-the-name-of-women-the-proposed-131st-amendment/

4.     Alok Prasanna, ‘A Potential Delimitation Compromise’ Economic & Political Weekly 60(12) (22 March 2025) https://www.epw.in/journal/2025/12/law-and-society/potential-delimitation-compromise.html

Note: This post has been authored by Divita Joshi as part of the CCAL Blog Explainer Series, in which our editors examine contemporary developments and unpack questions of constitutional significance.