LS polls can be held any time after Aug 31: CEC

New Delhi, May 23 (UNI) The Election Commission is prepared to hold the next Lok Sabha elections on the basis of redrawn constituencies any time after August 31, Chief Election Commissioner N Gopalaswamy said today.

''The revised electoral rolls in the redrawn constituencies will be ready by August 31,'' he told a press conference here.

The just-concluded polling in the Karnataka Assembly elections was conducted as per the redrawn constituencies, he said.

Also addressing the press conference, Justice Kuldip Singh, Chairman of the Delimitation Commission, said the delimitation work had been going on in the country except in states such as Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Nagaland, Jharkhand and Jammu and Kashmir.

He said the Commission had recommended to the Government that delimitation should be carried out after every census, so that readjustment of the constituencies including alterations and changes, were not too extensive and value of electoral vote remained more or less of equal weight. ''The Constitution may be suitably amended for this,'' he said.

The Commission also said the Government must consider suitable provision in law to provide for rotation in reservation of Scheduled Caste constituencies.

It also recommended that the next census in 2011 should be held panchayat-wise, so that the delimitation exercise thereafter was held on the basis of panchayat boundaries, ''This would also ensure common electoral roll in the country for all the three tiers of democracy,'' he said.

As the term of the Commission will expire on July 31, the Chairman has decided to demit office by the end of this month, Secretary of the Commission Shangara Ram said. A communique to this effect has already been sent to the Government.

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