The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the Centre to clarify its stance on carrying out the delimitation exercise of parliamentary and Assembly constituencies in Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland even as the government stated that the drive is being delayed because of the law-and-order situation in Manipur.

A bench of Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar did not seem to agree with the stand adopted by the Centre as it asked additional solicitor-general K.M. Natraj, appearing for the Union government, to take “instructions” from the government. It posted the matter for further hearing to January 2025.

The court orally observed that it was a statutory mandate which the government was bound to comply with. “You take instructions on this exercise. It is a statutory mandate and therefore you have to comply with it. If you don’t have 8A (Representation of Peoples Act) renotified, then you are in difficulty,” the CJI told Natraj.

Section 8A of the Representation of Peoples Act, 1950, provides for delimitation of parliamentary and Assembly constituencies in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur and Nagaland.

The court was dealing with a petition filed in 2020 by the organisation Delimitation Demand Committee for the State of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur and Nagaland in North East India alleging discrimination against the northeastern states in the conduct of delimitation exercise.