Assam merges 4 districts, redraws boundaries ahead of EC's delimitation deadline

The Assam Cabinet decided to merge four districts with existing ones and redraw boundaries in 14 places on Saturday, a day ahead of the Election Commission's (EC) deadline on starting the delimitation exercise for assembly and parliamentary seats.

The decision was taken at a meeting of the Assam Cabinet in New Delhi. With this, Biswanath district will get merged with Sonitpur, Hojai with Nagaon, Bajali with Barpeta and Tamulpur with Baksa.

The decision comes into effect immediately and notifications have been issued. The number of districts in Assam will now get reduced from 35 to 31.

Chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said it had to be done despite him not being very happy with them.

"I am not very comfortable with the decisions taken today, but sometimes we have to take some measures keeping the overall good of the state's people in mind, due to administrative exigencies and for a better future of Assam," Sarma told journalists in Delhi.

"This is a transitional phase and we will revive the four districts again once the delimitation exercise is over. In the meantime, the judicial, police and administrative offices in the four districts will keep functioning as usual," Sarma added.

On 27 December, EC announced fresh delimitation of 126 assembly and 14 parliamentary seats and banned creation of new administrative units with effect from January 1. While there would be no increase in seats due to delimitation, boundaries of some constituencies would get redrawn.

The chief minister said that there would be redrawing of boundaries in 14 areas for administrative reasons. While details of all such places have not been disclosed, he mentioned that the municipal area of North Guwahati, which falls in Kamrup (Rural) district, will now get included in Kamrup (Metropolitan) district.

"These decisions were needed. My Cabinet colleagues will visit these areas and talk to stakeholders to inform why we needed to take them. I expect the public to understand our view and cooperate with us," said Sarma.

"We had to take these decisions on the last day of the year as EC has already initiated the delimitation exercise and from tomorrow, we wouldn't have been able to take any such measures till the exercise get over. We could have taken these steps one by one, but had to club them together in one go," he added.