The Chandigarh Conundrum

The Chandigarh Conundrum

News: The newly elected Punjab Legislative Assembly passed a resolution, moved by the Chief Minister himself, on April 1 in a special session seeking the transfer of Chandigarh to Punjab.

About Bifurcation and Chandigarh:
• Under the Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966 following the Punjabi Suba movement, Haryana was carved out of the Hindi-speaking regions as a separate State.
• The hill regions of Punjab were merged with what was then the Union Territory (UT) of Himachal Pradesh.
• Chandigarh was made a UT and has remained the joint capital of Haryana and Punjab with State assets divided between Punjab and Haryana in a ratio of 60:40.

What is the Chandigarh Conundrum?
• The lack of full rights to Chandigarh since 1966
• It has featured as a common discourse, whether in the 1973 Anandpur Sahib resolution, Dharam Yudh Morcha (then separatist movement) and the 1985 Rajiv-Longowal Accord.
• The Punjab assembly has so far passed six such resolutions with the last being in 2014
• The Centres’ opposition to the latest Assembly resolution is the first time a political party has taken a contrarian stand.

What are Union Territories and How are they carved out of states?
• Part VIII of the Constitution is concerned with administration of the Union Territories.
• The President of India appoints an administrator or Lieutenant Governor for each UT. In practice, this means that the Union Territories follow the central government’s will.
• There are differences in governing of UTs depending on whether they have legislative assembly or not. For example, smaller ones such as Chandigarh, Daman, Diu and Dadra Nagar Haveli are governed directly by the centre. Puducherry and J&K are UTs with legislative assembly and government, alongwith an LG.
• As per Article 3 of the Indian Constitution, the constitutional power to create new states and UTs in India is solely reserved to the Parliament of India.
• Parliament can do so by announcing new states/union territories, separating territory from an existing state or merging two or more states/union territories or parts of them.