PANAJI
The ongoing delimitation process of the Zilla Panchayat constituencies in Goa could mark the final change to the State’s electoral boundaries for the foreseeable future. In a significant move, the Election authorities have decided that no further revisions to the boundaries of Assembly constituencies, municipal wards, or village panchayats will be undertaken after December 31, 2025.
This decision comes just ahead of four major elections -- municipal councils, municipal corporations, the State Assembly, and panchayat polls -- scheduled for 2026 and 2027.
This comes in the wake of directions from the Directorate of Census Operations (DCO) that announced a pause in the process to change the boundaries of districts, towns, villages and tehsils post December 31.
The move is expected to have far-reaching implications on the political landscape, especially with the State government deciding to increase the number of wards in ‘A’ class municipalities from 25 to 27 and further eyeing to reserve assembly seats for Scheduled Tribe (ST) communities in Goa.
Highly placed sources confirmed that the Centre has asked the States and Union Territories to make any proposed changes in the boundaries of administrative jurisdictions before December 31, 2025, when they will freeze for the Census-2027 exercise and the first phase of the decadal population count will begin on April 1 next year.
“The Census can be conducted only three months after the freezing of boundary limits of administrative units. State is told to ensure no changes in the boundaries from January 1, 2026 to March 2027,” sources said.
The first phase will be house-listing operations, which involve creating a comprehensive list of all buildings, structures, and housing units across the State, scheduled for April to September 2026. The second phase will be the population enumeration -- the headcount of the population -- which will take place from February 2027 onwards.
Also, the Pre-Test census will be conducted in Corgao village in Pernem taluka and the Margao municipal area in Salcete in October-November, this year.
Registrar general and census commissioner of India, Mritunjay Kumar Narayan in a communication to Goa government said, “the states/UTs should ensure that no changes should be made in the boundaries of administrative units between January 1, 2026, and March 31, 2027, during which Census exercise will take place. Any changes in the existing boundaries must be intimated to Census directorates in the states and UTs and Registrar General of India by December 31, 2025. For Census 2027, boundaries of administrative units will be frozen on December 31, 2025.”
Speaking to The Goan, State Election Commissioner IAS Daulat Hawaldar said that no redrawing of municipal or village boundaries would be undertaken post December 31. “We are currently undertaking delimitation of ZP constituencies. That will be finalized in one month time. After that we may not take up any such process since there are directions,” he said.
“We have to follow census guidelines. For the Census, all villages and towns are divided into uniform enumeration blocks…there cannot be any changes thereafter… population count cannot have errors,” Hawaldar explained.
While ZP elections are likely to be held in December, this year, the election to municipal councils are due in April 2026 while in June 2026, the Corporation of the City of Panaji will go to polls.
Further, the State Assembly elections would be due in February 2027 followed by panchayat polls in March 2027.
Sources in the Chief Electoral Officer, too confirmed that no delimitation exercise will be undertaken for Assembly polls. “Assembly boundaries would not be touched post December 31,” sources said.
Kumar Narayan in his letter has said that it is important that once enumeration blocks are finalised, boundaries of administrative units are not changed.
He asked the State to direct all the departments “to make any proposed changes in the boundaries of municipal corporations, revenue villages, tehsils, sub-divisions or districts before December 31”.
