Chennai, 12 August (H.S.):Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay on Wednesday moved a resolution in the State Assembly urging the Union government to permanently retain the strength of the Lok Sabha at 543 seats, seeking to protect States that have successfully controlled population growth from losing their relative parliamentary representation.

The resolution also called for implementation of the 33 per cent reservation for women in the Lok Sabha from the 2029 general election, without making the quota dependent on delimitation or an increase in the number of parliamentary constituencies.

Moving the resolution, Vijay said women’s reservation could be implemented on the basis of the existing 543 Lok Sabha constituencies and argued that there was no justification for postponing it until the completion of a future delimitation exercise.

“Reservation for women is not a concession, it is their democratic right,” Vijay told the House, stressing the need to increase women’s representation in Parliament without further delay.

The Chief Minister also urged the Centre to ensure that States which successfully implemented population-control programmes were not placed at a disadvantage when parliamentary constituencies are redrawn.

Tamil Nadu and other southern States have raised concerns that a redistribution of Lok Sabha seats primarily on the basis of population could increase the parliamentary strength of States with higher population growth while reducing their own relative representation.

The resolution seeks to address these concerns by calling for a permanent freeze on the Lok Sabha’s total strength at 543 while accommodating the constitutionally mandated 33 per cent reservation for women within the existing number of seats.

After Vijay tabled the resolution, Assembly Speaker JCD Prabhakar opened it for discussion and invited legislators to place their views on record.

Members belonging to the Left parties spoke in support of the resolution. The DMDK also welcomed the proposal, backing both the protection of Tamil Nadu’s parliamentary representation and immediate implementation of the 33 per cent women’s reservation.

---------------

Hindusthan Samachar / Arun Lakshman