GoM told to raise T seats

New Delhi: National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) Vice-Chairman M Shashidhar Reddy on Tuesday led a delegation to Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, who heads the GoM on Telangana and urged that seats in Telangana Assembly should be raised from 119 to 153, besides retaining the Legislative Council in Telangana.
Home Minister Shinde is understood to have called up Shashidhar Reddy from Ranchi on Monday to inquire about the purpose of the meeting and on Tuesday morning, he asked Union Home Secretary Anil Goswami to be present, as he accorded importance to the proposal. Shinde assured the delegation that the GoM will discuss the issue and take appropriate decision on it.

The delegation included former APCC President V Hanumanth Rao, Mallu Ravi, Nandi Yellaiah, J Chittaranjan Das, Shankar Rao, Kodanda Reddy and several former Ministers and former legislators.

After his meeting with Home Minister Shinde, Shashidhar Reddy said the proposal is important because it not only contributes to political stability, but increases people’s representation and also helps the newly-carved out State to retain the Legislative Council. States like Jharkhand have been witnessing political instability. If the Assembly has larger number of seats, the political instability can be avoided to a great extent, argued Shashidhar Reddy. The process will not involve an exercise under the Delimitation Act, which could delay the process. Instead, the Election Commission, with a 5-member MLAs team assisting it, can undertake and complete the process ahead of the General Election in 2014.

Soon after the Telangana Bill is passed, the Telangana Legislative Council will be in place and the sitting MLAs will become members of the Telangana Provisional Assembly. Shashidhar Reddy, who is credited with coming up with the proposal, consulted all the Union Ministers from Telangana, State Ministers, MPs, MLAs, MLCs, former MLAs and former MLCs, Corporation Chairmen, APCC office-bearers and DCC Presidents to build a consensus on the issue, before taking it up with the GoM.

Since raising the number seats in the Assembly will benefit all political parties, there is a broad political consensus across party lines. The Telangana JAC and other political parties have also been sounded out and the move has been broadly welcomed. By increasing 34 Assembly seats, the 17 Lok Sabha seats will each have 9 Assembly segments. The total number of seats will go up to 153, plus one Nominated. The increase in the number of seats has to be part of the GoM recommendation to the Union Cabinet to be incorporated in the Telangana Bill.