In Focus: Women’s Reservation and the Delimitation Dilemma
The special parliamentary session held from April 16 to 18, 2026, could have been a watershed moment in the history of the Indian Parliament. The Women’s Reservation Bill, which heavily weighs on the political empowerment of women, once again failed to reach the required majority. It is unfortunate that the constitutional procedural pathway for census and delimitation resulted in political fallout and continues to shadow a historic overdue reform that promises gender representation.
The government tabled the Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill, 2026, the Union Territories Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2026, and the Delimitation Bill, 2026, in the parliament with a special session. Collectively, these Bills were slated to increase the size of the Lok Sabha, enabling delimitation based on the 2011 census, and pave the way for women’s reservation. The Union Territories (UTs) Laws Bill gives effect to similar provisions for Puducherry, Delhi, and Jammu & Kashmir. Instead of ushering in institutional reform, the debate on the Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam (The Women’s Reservation Bill/WRB) led to a political gridlock and the houses were adjourned sine die without any conclusion.
Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam
The Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, commonly known as the Women’s Reservation Bill (WRB), and covered in Aakhya Weekly #65, seeks to reserve one-third (33%) of seats in the Lok Sabha and state legislative assemblies for women. The Bill rests on three core provisions. First, it mandates a 33% reservation for women across all seats, including a sub-quota within existing Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) reservations, ensuring that one-third of SC/ST seats are also allocated to women from these communities; this framework extends to the Legislative Assembly of the National Capital Territory of Delhi. Second, the reservation will come into effect only after the next Census is conducted and a delimitation exercise is carried out based on its findings. Third, the reserved seats are to be rotated after each delimitation cycle. Although the Constitution (106th Amendment) Act, 2023 was passed by both Houses of Parliament in September 2023, its rollout has remained politically contentious, particularly due to the conditionality tied to Census and delimitation, as well as debates around representation and the absence of additional sub-quotas.
The Union Ministry of Law and Justice has notified April 16, 2026, as the date on which the provisions of the Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam (Constitution (106th Amendment) Act, 2023) came into force. This marks the formal operationalisation of the Act in legal terms. However, this should not be conflated with the immediate implementation of women’s reservation in legislatures. The Act itself makes implementation conditional on the completion of a fresh Census followed by a delimitation exercise, and this distinction is critical.
Interpreting the Provisions
While the notification may be interpreted as triggering the Act’s 15-year duration clause, there remains ambiguity over whether this period should begin from the date of notification or from the point at which the reservation is actually implemented. The original constitutional framework specifies the duration of reservation but does not clearly resolve this question, leaving room for legal and policy interpretation. Further, the Act explicitly states that the 33% reservation will come into effect only after the publication of the next Census and the completion of delimitation based on it. Although earlier discussions tentatively pointed to a post-2027 timeline, the absence of a confirmed Census schedule makes the rollout uncertain.
Understanding this dependency makes it essential to examine delimitation itself. It involves the long process of redrawing electoral constituency boundaries based on population changes to ensure equitable representation. Articles 82 and 170 of the Constitution mandate such exercises after every Census. The last Delimitation Commission, constituted in 2002 based on the 2001 Census, implemented its recommendations in 2008, readjusting constituency boundaries without altering the total number of seats. In effect, while the law is now in force, its core promise, political reservation for women, remains contingent on future institutional processes, making delimitation the key trigger for its eventual implementation. In this context, the Women’s Reservation framework is directly tied to the next delimitation cycle, making delimitation not just a technical exercise, but a critical trigger for operationalising political reservation for women.
Why did the Government link it with WRB?
Under the 2023 arrangement, the government would have to wait for the 2027 Census and subsequent delimitation, which could potentially delay the implementation of women’s reservation until as late as 2034. Therefore, the government sought to bring the implementation forward. With the amendments, the reservation policy could have been implemented as early as the 2029 general elections.
Undoubtedly, the government’s attempt to link the two can be justified within a strong constitutional framework. First, technical feasibility requires that reservations be applied to properly demarcated constituencies. Second, legal robustness implies that implementing the one-third rule without delimitation would violate constitutional provisions. Third, it adheres to the norm of a rotational mechanism, ensuring that the benefits of reservation are distributed across constituencies over time. Therefore, this approach strengthens both the structure and uniformity of the system.
Where is the Conflict?
Even though the government intended to implement the reservation in the 2029 Lok Sabha elections based on the 2011 Census, this would rely on data that is 18 years old. Waiting for the next Census, along with delimitation in either case, would only delay the implementation further, effectively prolonging women’s wait for representation. By linking women’s reservation to delimitation, the Act ties a social justice reform to a politically contentious process; even if not explicit, this undercurrent remains strong.
Expansion of seats and Delimitation: The expansion of Lok Sabha seats to roughly 850, in order to accommodate 33 per cent reservation for women, could significantly affect southern states in terms of representation.
The 42nd Constitutional Amendment froze the total number of seats allocated to each state in the Lok Sabha and State Assemblies based on the 1971 Census, initially until the first Census after 2000. The 84th Constitutional Amendment (2001) extended this freeze until the first Census after 2026. This was intended as an incentive for states to pursue population stabilisation.
While increasing the number of seats in Parliament is necessary to ensure representation remains proportional to population, delimitation, though a technical exercise, is also politically sensitive. This cannot be overlooked, particularly in the context of Assembly elections underway in states such as Assam, Kerala, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu, and West Bengal.
Federal imbalance creating North vs South Divide: Another major point of contention relates to seat allocation in the Lok Sabha. Projected changes have raised concerns about a potential dilution of political voice in certain regions. This also raises questions about whether states that have performed better on population control and broader development indicators may be relatively disadvantaged under a revised seat distribution framework.
Undermining the power of Rajya Sabha: The proposal for a proportional increase of about 50 per cent in Lok Sabha seats remains silent on corresponding changes in the Rajya Sabha. This raises concerns that the government of the day could, in effect, command numbers that risk destabilising the federal balance, which is a core pillar of India’s constitutional framework and part of its basic structure.
Image 1: Possible projection of seat sharing after Delimitation
Source: Hindustan Times
Image 2: Projected seat sharing state-wise
At a time when the world has witnessed the achievements of Nari Shakti across sectors, the procedural requirements of the Census and delimitation appear to impede the long-overdue implementation of women’s reservation in the corridors of power. India already has a working case study in the form of women’s representation in local governance, and a similar model could help make the one-third reservation a reality at higher levels.
While there are clear differences in terms of procedural requirements, particularly the role of delimitation and the need for institutional deliberation, it is evident that there is a broad national consensus on enhancing women’s representation. Bridging political differences and creating a clear implementation pathway will be key to operationalising the Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam in both letter and spirit.
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A Few Good Reads
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Syed Munir Khasru suggests that West Bengal’s elections matter to Bangladesh not for outcomes alone but for how state-level politics shape cross-border issues, migration narratives, and the broader tone of India–Bangladesh relations.