By Rana Ajit, IANS
New Delhi : The Supreme Court says the Election Commission committed a constitutional error when it hiked the number of reserved seats for Scheduled Tribes in Uttarakhand from two to three in 2001 for reasons other than tribal population.
The Supreme Court, which detected the lapse, has warned the poll panel against “going beyond the mandate of the constitution”.
The error was found during adjudication of a petition challenging the Election Commission’s Nov 5, 2001, notification that reserved the Dharchula assembly seat in Uttarakhand’s Pitthorgarh district, thereby increasing the number of tribal seats in the state from two to three.
This was done although tribals comprise only three percent of Uttarakhand’s population, constitutionally entitling them to only two seats in the 70-member state assembly.
The Dharchula seat had been reserved on “extraneous” grounds like “its geographical location near the international border requiring special steps for its development and popular demand to increase the tribal representation”, the apex court found.
Pointing out the error in the poll panel order, Justices A.K. Mathur and Markandey Katju, constituting a bench, last week said: “Article 332(3) of the Constitution of India mandates that the reservation must be made in proportion to the population of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes of the state.”
This should be the paramount consideration of the Election Commission (in reserving a seat) and not any other consideration,” the bench added.
“The mandate of the constitution is supreme and the Election Commission has no scope to go beyond the mandate of the constitution,” the bench said, chiding the autonomous body for increasing the number of tribal seats in the state.
“We hope and trust that in future the Election Commission shall confine itself to the mandate of the provisions of the constitution of India and not be swayed by any other considerations,” the bench said.
Realising its blunder, the Election Commission rectified its error by reducing the number of reserved tribal seats back to two midway through hearing of the case. This helped it escape the apex court’s wrath.