ANAND SINGH KUNWAR Vs. ELECTION COMMISSION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a petition transferred from the High Court on the request of the Union of India and it has been registered as Transferred Case No. 20 of 2004. The Writ Petition was filed by the petitioner before the High Court with the following prayers:

(2.) The petitioners are the citizens of India and residents of Dharchula constituency. They filed the Writ Petition before the Uttaranchal High Court in public interest inter alia, praying for issuance of a Writ of Certiorari or any other appropriate writ, direction or order quashing the Notification No. 282/UTT/2001-DEL dated 5.11.2001 issued by the Respondent No. 1 i.e. Election Commission of India insofar as it pertains to increasing the reserved seats for Scheduled Tribes in the State of Uttaranchal. The Election Commission passed an order in continuance to this Notification under Sub-section 5 of Section 22 of the Uttar Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2000 in respect of the delimitation of Assembly constituencies in the State of Uttaranchal and by that order the number of seats in the legislative Assembly of the State of Uttaranchal was fixed at seventy by the Election Commission and the Election Commission has determined the number of seats to be reserved for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the legislative Assembly of Uttaranchal as twelve (12) and three (3) respectively. That means, three (3) seats were reserved for Scheduled Tribes which is the subject matter of dispute in the present case.

(3.) The main contention of the petitioner in this petition is that as per the census data the population of the Scheduled Tribes is 3% of the total population of Uttaranchal and as per the delimitation of State of Uttaranchal, seventy (70) single member territorial assembly constituencies were created in the State of Uttaranchal. In reference to Article 332(3) of the Constitution of India the number of seats as far as possible is to the extent of 3% of the seventy (70) seats of the State of Uttaranchal. That comes to 2.1 which is nearer to two (2) seats than to three (3) seats, but the Election Commission has fixed three (3) seats for Scheduled Tribes which is beyond the provisions of the Constitution.