In this episode of South Central, hosts Dhanya Rajendran, Pooja Prasanna and Leena Reghunath are joined by activist and journalist Shivasundar and retired bureaucrat PV Ramesh to discuss India’s looming delimitation exercise and Naxalism’s journey in Karnataka.
The panel looks at concerns of delimitation shrinking South India’s political representation if more seats go to northern states? What would that mean for governance, federalism, and the country’s power balance?
PV Ramesh says: “It does not really matter how many citizens one MP represents – certainly, the lesser, the better – but any revision must be pro-rata across the country. If seats must increase, it should be across the board by 10-20 percent without reference to population, ensuring fair representation for union territories and smaller states.” In a country as diverse as India, a one-size-fits-all rule won’t work, he adds.
Shivasundar argues for devolution of power along with the numerical increase: “Why should the Lok Sabha have so much power? Devolve the power to the regional states. Bengaluru is developing as Delhi, and Raichur is developing as another Bihar. So when you say South, South is not uniform in that sense. This is a consequence of the mode of development we are pursuing. Unless we attend to that, these superficial solutions will not go to the roots.”
Highlighting the lack of transparency from the union government’s side, Dhanya says, “The BJP is very calculative. They aren’t revealing how many seats will be added or which states will gain. That itself shows there’s a political strategy behind it.”
Pooja adds, “This isn’t about north vs south, but about fairness. Why should states that effectively controlled their populations be punished while those that didn’t are rewarded?”
As the conversation turns to Karnataka recently declaring itself “Naxal-free,” the panel examines whether the Naxalite movement has truly dissipated or has only changed its form in the state.
Questioning the official narrative on the state’s anti-Naxal operations, Shivasundar says, “The idea that Naxalism has been ‘eliminated’ is misleading. The state has used repression, but it has not addressed the conditions that gave rise to the movement.”
He also argues that Naxalism is more than an armed movement – it’s an ideology born from deep inequalities. “The armed rebellion may have ended, but as long as the conditions that created it exist, the ideology isn’t going anywhere,” he says.
Tune in for an in-depth discussion.
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Audio Timecodes
00:00:00 – Introduction
00:02:05 – Support TNM
00:03:00 – Headlines
00:08:54 – Delimitation
00:39:57 – Naxalism in Karnataka
01:07:44 – Letters
01:11:30 – Recommendations
Recommendations
Shivasundar
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I Am on the Hit List: Murder and Myth-making in South India
Iconoclast: A Reflective Biography of Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar
PV Ramesh
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Leena Reghunath
Pooja Prasanna
Jane Fonda: Life Achievement Award Acceptance Speech
Dhanya Rajendran
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Produced by Bhuvan Malik, edited by Jaseem Ali.
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