Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal.
Credit: PTI Photo
New Delhi: The number of Scheduled Tribes in Goa is five times more than that of Scheduled Castes but have no seat reserved for them in the State Assembly, while the Dalits have one. To correct this anomaly, the Narendra Modi government is all set to introduce a Bill in the Lok Sabha on Monday.
Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal is scheduled to table 'The Readjustment of Representation of Scheduled Tribes in Assembly Constituencies of the State of Goa Bill 2024' for enabling reservation of seats in accordance with Article 332 of the Constitution. The readjustment is necessitated by inclusion of certain communities in the list of STs in the state of Goa, the Bill said.
No seats were earmarked for STs in Goa during the 2002 delimitation exercise based on the 2001 Census. STs were pegged at 566 in Goa in 2001.
However, through a central legislation in 2003, the Bill said, three new communities - Kunbi, Gawda and Velip were included in the List of Scheduled Tribes of Goa, which “increased the number” of Scheduled Tribes population in Goa “considerably”.
“A peculiar situation has arisen in the state, wherein the population of the Scheduled Tribes in the state vis-à-vis the population of Scheduled Castes is considerably higher… but no seats are reserved for Scheduled Tribes and they are unable to avail the constitutional benefit of reservation afforded to them by article 332”, the Statement of Objects and Reasons of the Bill said.
According to the 2011 Census, Goa’s total population was 14.58 lakh, which included 25,449 SCs and 1,49,275 STs. The Pernem Assembly seat is reserved for SCs.
A Bill needs to be passed in the Parliament for this purpose as there is no provision in the Representation of the People Act, 1950 or in the Representation of the People Act, 1951, or in the Delimitation Act, 2002, enabling the Election Commission to carry out further delimitation of constituencies or to determine constituencies for the SCs and STs in states and UTs where delimitation was carried out under the 2002 Act.