The Supreme Court has dismissed the Petitions seeking early delimitation for the states of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh while observing that the proviso to Article 170(3) expressly bars any readjustment in the total number of seats in the Legislative Assemblies of States until the first census after the year 2026.

The Apex Court also made it clear that Article 170 has no application to Union Territories, including the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, and one cannot claim parity between the position of Jammu and Kashmir and that of the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

The two Writ Petitions before the Apex Court instituted under Article 32 of the Constitution of India, assailed the legality of Notification Nos. SO No. 1015(E) dated March 6, 2020 (2020 Notification) and SO 1023(E) dated March 3, 2021 (2021 Notification) issued by the Union of India through the Ministry of Law and Justice whereby a delimitation exercise was conducted for the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, increasing the number of seats in the Legislative Assembly. However, the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana were excluded.

The Division Bench of Justice Surya Kant and Justice Nongmeikapam Kotiswar Singh observed, “...exclusion of the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana from the purview of the delimitation process under the Impugned Notifications does not suffer from the vice of arbitrariness or discrimination. The distinction drawn is firmly anchored in the constitutional structure, particularly the proviso to Article 170 (3), which expressly bars any readjustment in the total number of seats in the Legislative Assemblies of States until the first census after the year 2026. The legislative and constitutional framework thus provides a clear and rational basis for such tailored administrative distinction.”

“Article 170 has no application to Union Territories, including the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. The Petitioner(s), therefore, cannot claim parity between the position of Jammu and Kashmir and that of the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, which remain subject to the constitutional scheme governing States”, it added.

Senior Advocate Ravi Shankar Jandhyala represented the Appellant while ASG K.M. Nataraj represented the Respondent.

Factual Background

The Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014 (AP Reorganisation Act) came into force with effect from June 2, 2014, leading to the bifurcation of the erstwhile State of Andhra Pradesh into two separate states, namely, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. Thereafter, the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019 (J&K Reorganisation Act) came into force on October 31, 2019, bifurcating the then State of Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories (i) Jammu and Kashmir and (ii) Ladakh. In the year 2020, a Notification was issued under Section 3 of the Delimitation Act, 2002 (Delimitation Act), constituting a Delimitation Commission for a period of one year, for the delimitation of Assembly and Parliamentary constituencies in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, the States of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland.

The States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana did not find any mention in the 2020 Notification. The 2020 Notification was, however, amended in 2021, thereby extending the term of the Delimitation Commission by one more year. This notification also clarified that the scope of the delimitation exercise would be restricted to the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir only, thereby excluding the States of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland. According to the Petitioners, the exclusion of the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana from the scope of delimitation under the Impugned Notifications was discriminatory. The Petitioners consequently sought a direction to the Respondents to increase the number of seats in the Legislative Assemblies of the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana in terms of the applicable statutory provisions.

Reasoning

The Bench explained that the proviso to Article 170(3) of the Constitution unequivocally and overarchingly provides that it shall not be necessary to readjust the allocation of seats in the Legislative Assembly of each State, including the division of each State into territorial constituencies, until the relevant figures for the first census taken after the year 2026 have been published.

“What is even more compelling is the inevitable consequence that would follow if the reliefs sought in these Writ Petitions were to be granted. It would open the floodgates to similar demands from other States, each seeking early delimitation on the ground of parity or administrative convenience”, it said. The Bench also noted that the four North-Eastern States—Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, and Nagaland—which were expressly excluded from the scope of delimitation by way of the 2021 Notification, may justifiably question the legitimacy and fairness of such selective implementation.

“In view of the foregoing analysis, we hold that the constitutional mandate under Article 170(3) of the Constitution serves as a bar on any delimitation exercise concerning the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, or any other State. The demand for immediate delimitation in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana runs contrary to both the letter and spirit of the constitutional design”, it held.

Next, the Bench dealt with the submission that the omission to conduct delimitation in the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, while proceeding with the same in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, constituted an arbitrary and discriminatory classification which is violative of Article 14 of the Constitution. As per the Bench, the distinction drawn by the Respondents was not only rational but found explicit recognition in the constitutional architecture.

The Bench explained that Jammu and Kashmir, having been reconstituted as a Union Territory under the J&K Reorganisation Act, is not governed by the provisions of the Constitution, which pertain exclusively to State Legislatures. On the contrary, the governance and composition of Union Territory legislatures are regulated by Parliamentary Legislation enacted under Article 239A of the Constitution. Moreover, Article 170 of the Constitution, including the constitutional freeze on delimitation under clause (3), has no application to the Legislative Assembly of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir.

“The two States in question and the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir operate in distinct constitutional domains, and any delimitation exercise carried out in one cannot serve as a benchmark or ground of comparison for the other. The delimitation undertaken for the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir cannot be mechanically extended to States bound by the express embargo under Article 170(3) of the Constitution. As such, the invocation of Article 14, in this context, is wholly misplaced and does not withstand legal scrutiny”, it said. The Bench thus found no merit in the contention that the exclusion of the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana from the scope of the delimitation exercise under the Impugned Notification is arbitrary, discriminatory, or violative of Article 14.

Finding no merit in the petitioners’ reliance on the doctrine of legitimate expectation, the Court stated, “In matters governed by express constitutional provisions and legislative policy, this doctrine cannot be invoked to claim an enforceable right contrary to the constitutional arrangement.” Thus, dismissing the Petition, the Bench said, “ The delimitation exercise carried out in Jammu and Kashmir—being governed by a distinct constitutional and statutory regime—cannot be analogically extended to States that are explicitly bound by the constitutional restraint imposed under Article 170(3).” Dimssing the Petition, the Bench held that the Impugned Notifications thus do not violate Article 14 of the Constitution.

Cause Title: K. Purushottam Reddy v. Union of India and Ors. (Neutral Citation: 2025 INSC 894)

Appearance

Appellant: Senior Advocate Ravi Shankar Jandhyala, Advocates M.S. Vishnu Sankar, Aditya Santosh, Haritha H, Dimple Nagpal, AOR Lawfic, AOR Rao Ranjit

Respondent: ASG K.M. Nataraj, Senior Advocates Subramaniam, Maninder Singh, Advocates Sharath Narayan Nambiar, Indira Bhakar, Vinayak Sharma, Vatsal Joshi, Anuj Srinivas Udupa, Chitransh Sharma, Satvika Thakur, Yogya Rajpurohit, Aayush Saklani, Nikita Capoor, AOR Prateek Kumar, Advocates Ashita Chawla, Rangasaran Mohan, Amarpal Singh Dua, Milind Rai

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Justice Surya KantJustice Nongmeikapam Kotiswar Singh

Tulip Kanth

Assistant Editor

Tulip Kanth is an Assistant Editor at Verdictum having over 5 years of experience in the field of legal journalism and editing. She extensively covers judgments of the Supreme Court, High Courts as well as Tribunals. She has previously worked with a legal publishing website where she oversaw the work of other editors and has also created updates on notifications of different Government Ministries. She holds an English Honours Degree from SGTB Khalsa College, Delhi University and has completed her LLB course with specialisation in Corporate Law from Amity University.