Representation puzzle for Centre

A just delimitation strategy must correct the representation imbalance and avoid penalising states doing well on demographic management

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Tamil Nadu chief minister MK Stalin has called a meeting of all recognised political parties in the state on March 5 to discuss delimitation, which will change the number of Lok Sabha seats across states. The politics behind the idea is simple. Southern states such as Tamil Nadu and Kerala now have a much smaller share in India's population today than what they had when the existing distribution of Lok Sabha seats was done. Any redistribution which works on the basis of current population numbers will lead to a drastic fall in the north-south balance in India's national legislative. The population differential between the north and the south is largely because of the latter bringing down its fertility rates faster than the former.