Delimiting by electors rather than population offers a fairer approach

Several recent articles in the mainstream media suggest that a delimitation exercise — if carried out with population as the primary criterion for allocating parliamentary constituencies (PCs) — would disproportionately disadvantage the southern States.Proponents of this view argue that the southern States, having adhered more rigorously to family planning norms than their northern counterparts, would either receive comparatively fewer PC seats or could even be left with less seats than what they have currently.

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But the broader question that has not been adequately discussed is: what is the most rational criterion for allocation of PCs: population or the number of electors?Electors in a constituency are not always a subset of the population. Many electors may live outside their registered PCs, or may have failed to register. Census records are sensitive to migration, as they are based merely on a stay of six months or more (or even an intention to stay), without even requiring any proof of residence or registration in the voter list.

Migrants also generally avoid/delay transferring their voter registration for various reasons. Furthermore, variations in the age structure — such as a higher proportion of under-18s — may also lead to large differences in elector numbers between PCs with similar populations.|mportantly, the principle of ‘one person, one vote, one value’ aligns more closely with electors than the population. Using elector data avoids the wait for a Census and offers a more accurate measure of representation. The value of a vote can be considered inversely proportional to the number of electors ina PC. Data shows that vote value has varied significantly across regions and over time. Union Territories (UTs), hilly States, and north-eastern States have consistently had a disproportionately high vote value from 1951 to 2024, due to geographical considerations and the minimum representation requirement from each State.