India, Nepal’s southern neighbour, comprises of 29 states, seven union territories and has a population of 1.2 billion according to its 2011 census. In every state, a chief minister is an elected head of the provincial government for a five-year term.  Union territories, unlike states, are directly ruled by the central government. But some union territories in India, such as Delhi or Chandigarh, have a local legislature and a chief minister. In 1956, there were 14 states in India which have now increased to 29. This is testimony to the fact that provinces are not set in stone. Rather, they are subject to people’s aspirations.

The Indian Parliament is bicameral in nature—Rajya Sabha is the Upper House and Lok Sabha is the Lower House. The Lok Sabha (People’s Assembly) is composed of 545 members, 543 apportioned among the states through people’s vote and two chosen by the president.  

Unequal representation

There is a huge disparity in India’s democracy in terms of representation. The voices of the populous northern states are less valued than that of the southern states. The four southern states namely Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala account for just over 18 percent of the total population of India, but they get 112 seats in the Lok Sabha. The two most populous Indian states, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, account for 25 percent of the Indian population but they only get 120 seats. Kerala is as big as Jharkhand and only slightly bigger than Assam in terms of population, but it gets 20 seats in the Lok Sabha while Jharkhand and Assam only get 14 seats each.

Similarly, the population of Bihar is more than 100 million whereas population of Tamil Nadu is 70 million. But the representation of both the states in the Lok Sabha is approximately the same—40 seats for Bihar and 39 for Tamil Nadu.  However, Rajasthan, whose population is almost the same as Tamil Nadu only has 25 Lok Sabha seats while Madhya Pradesh, whose population is slightly greater than that of Tamil Nadu, has 29 Lok Sabha seats.  

The core states of India—Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand and Haryana—account for 45 percent of the total population of the country, but they receive 214 seats (39 percent) that are distributed among them. If Lok Sabha seats were distributed only according to population, they would have received 244 seats—30 seats more than what they currently get. According to existent provisions, every 2.5 million people in Uttar Pradesh are represented by a single seat in the Lower House while the Union Territory of Lakshadweep receives one seat for every 64,000 people.

Against this backdrop, the obvious question would be: why does the seat allocation in India’s Parliament not reflect its population? This is because the allocation of seats in the Lok Sabha is not truly based on population. Another important fact about India’s Parliament is that the current number of seats in Lok Sabha (543) is based on India’s 1971 census, halting the change in number of representation of each state till 2026. Until then, the numbers will be kept constant, irrespective of the absolute population according to Election Commission of India.

Lessons for Nepal

For a while, let us keep the issue of unscientific population allocation at bay and argue that Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and Rajasthan are also well-represented. Yet, why are these states underdeveloped in comparison to the rest? The states of Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Gujarat are ahead in terms of development not because of higher representation in Parliament but due to better governance and improvements in the provision of basic physical infrastructures such as education, health, sanitation, among others. This could hold a lesson for Nepal: increasing the number of constituencies and representation do not necessarily ensure development of the provinces.

Additionally, when it comes to representation, Nepal’s new constitution is far better than India’s constitution. Nepal’s statute has reserved 40 percent (110 seats) out of 275 total parliamentary seats for backward communities: women, Dalit, Janajati, Madhesis and Muslims. India does not follow such a proportional electoral system.  Further, as per Article 84 of Nepal’s new constitution, 165 constituencies will be carved on the basis of both population and geography. As mentioned earlier, Indian electoral representation system has not been amended since 1973 (44 years). But in the case of Nepal, it will be amended in every 20 years (Article 286). However, as half of the total population of Nepal reside in the Tarai we need to make slight changes in the current seven-province model of federalism. Merely having two provinces in the Tarai is not justifiable for half of the population.

India has reserved parliamentary seats for its less-populated areas like Lakshadweep, Daman, Dadra and Sikkim. The same system can be followed in Nepal—parliamentary seats need to be ensured for smaller districts such as Manang and Mustang. For a country like Nepal which has a highly diverse geography and unequal development pattern, adopting a parliamentary seat-allocation system based only on population might not be reasonable. In this context, the experience of India neither very relevant nor useful.

Representation should be based on index numbers that take various significant factors into account such as population, Gross Domestic Product per capita, Human Development Index, remoteness and geographical area. This system should be followed in Nepal and might as well be useful for India as it is using an outdated population record for not only allocating parliamentary seats but also to distribute resources.

Devkota holds a PhD in fiscal decentralisation