PANAJI
In a major disappointment to the Schedule Tribe (ST) community, the Central government has declined Goa’s proposal to grant them political reservation in 2027 Assembly polls.
In a communication to the Director of Tribal Welfare on July 28, the Legislative Department -- Government of India has said that the next delimitation exercise and the readjustment of seats, including the number of seats to be reserved for Scheduled Caste (SC) and ST would be done after the new Delimitation Commission is constituted based on the census taken after 2026.
Following directions from the Parliamentary Committee for Welfare of SCs/STs, the State Tribal Department in May had written to the Centre to reserve four seats for ST in the Goa assembly by constituting a delimitation commission, based on the 2011 Census data. This was a long pending demand of the community.
The Assistant Legislative Counsel Girdhar Verma in the letter said that the readjustment of Parliamentary and Legislative Assembly constituencies was undertaken in accordance with the provisions of the Delimitation Act, 2002 by the Delimitation Commission and based on the order issued in 2008.
He said that as per the Constitution, until the relevant figures for the first census taken after the year 2026 have been published, it shall not be necessary to readjust the seats in the Legislative Assembly of each State.
“Therefore it is clear that the next delimitation exercise and readjustment of seats, including the number of seats to be reserved for the SCs and STs would only take place by the Delimitation Commission to be constituted for the purpose after the relevant figures of the census taken after the year 2026 is published,” Verma said.
Mission Political Reservation for Scheduled Tribes of Goa had been pressing for political reservation based on Census data of 2001. They wanted a notification on the reservation to be issued before the Lok Sabha election of 2024.
Earlier in April, ST leaders along with assembly speaker Ramesh Tawadkar had submitted the proposal to the Union Ministry for Law, Home and Director of Tribal Affairs, the Government of India.
