“One Nation One Election” Will It Affect the Constitution of India?
The Constitution (129th) Amendment Bill, which proposes changes to allow simultaneous federal and state elections in India, has sparked intense debates in Parliament. Introduced by Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal in the Lok Sabha, the bill faced several hours of heated discussions before a vote, which saw 269 MPs in favor and 198 against. With this first hurdle cleared, the bill will now be referred to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) for further examination.
31 MPs will form this JPC, including Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha members. The Speaker of the House, Om Birla, is expected to finalize the committee’s composition within 48 hours, a tight deadline given that the current Parliament session concludes on Friday. If this timeline is not met, the bill will lapse and must be reintroduced in the next session. Political parties have been asked to propose their members for the committee. While the exact distribution of seats has yet to be announced, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), as the largest party, is likely to hold a majority and chair the committee.
Typically, 21 out of the 31 MPs on a JPC are from the Lok Sabha. Once the committee is formed, it will have 90 days to submit a report, though this period can be extended if necessary.
So, what will the JPC focus on? Its primary task will be to conduct “wider consultations” with various stakeholders, including MPs not part of the committee, legal and constitutional experts, former judges, lawyers, and even former members of the Election Commission. The Election Commission, as the body responsible for overseeing elections, will play a pivotal role in organizing simultaneous elections should the proposed constitutional amendments and the ‘One Nation, One Election’ bill be passed and ratified by the states. The committee is also expected to seek input from Assembly Speakers and possibly the public before drafting a final report.
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The idea behind ‘One Nation One Election’ is simple but ambitious: to hold both Lok Sabha (national) and state Assembly elections in the same year, if not simultaneously. Only four states—Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, and Odisha—hold their Assembly elections alongside the Lok Sabha elections. Other states, like Maharashtra and Haryana, hold their elections in different cycles. The rest follow a non-synchronized five-year cycle.
For this proposal to become a reality, several constitutional amendments would be needed, affecting Articles 83, 85, 172, 174, and possibly Article 356. Legal experts caution that without these amendments, the proposal could be challenged as unconstitutional, particularly for potentially disrupting India’s federal structure.
With the clock ticking and intense political discussions underway, the success of the ‘One Nation One Election‘ proposal will depend on careful deliberation, consensus-building, and constitutional