Kohima, April 29: Associate members of the Delimitation Commission have urged the Election Commission to classify Nagaland as a “reserved” parliamentary seat.

Sources said the issue would be pursued after the ongoing election process was over. Nagaland, which has a majority Naga tribal population, has been a “general category” parliamentary seat since the last delimitation exercise in 1972-73.

“It was, maybe, an oversight,” chief electoral officer for Nagaland, Lalthara, told the media here today. He said he was surprised to know the state’s category after taking over as the chief electoral officer of the state.

“It should have been a Scheduled Tribe reserved seat,” he said. However, no one from elsewhere in the country had ever contested from the seat except Naga candidates.

“With the delimitation exercise scheduled for completion by the end of the year, the seat will be classified before it,” he said.

However, hurdles are expected on the way, as all political parties in the state are averse to delimitation for fear of losing their vote banks because of restructuring of constituencies.

Lalthara said this was true for Assembly seats only and there would be no hurdles in case of the lone parliamentary seat.

Last year also, the state-based associate members of the Delimitation Commission had submitted a memorandum to the Election Commission to classify Nagaland as a reserved seat.

On the allegations about illegal immigrants being allowed to vote, Lalthara urged the NGOs to be more vigilant against the menace.

He urged all the NGOs and individuals to bring illegal voters to the notice of the Election Commission.

He praised the Mizoram government’s initiative to verify names ticked in the electoral rolls as “suspected illegal immigrants”.

“But no one is doing that in Nagaland,” he said.

State returning officer T.N. Mannen, however, said the people in the state have become more conscious now. “People are more objective during the Lok Sabha elections,” he said.

Cong changes stand: The Congress said militants groups were not involved in the Lok Sabha election process.

Nagaland goes to the polls on May 5, a year and three months after the Assembly elections in which S.C. Jamir was dethroned.

Ever since, the Congress has been alleging that the Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah) had played a major role in the defeat of the Congress in the Assembly elections.

“It was a war between Jamir and the NSCN (I-M),” Jamir had told newspersons after losing the polls.

Today, however, the Congress said there was no rebel interference in the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls.

“The rebels are not getting involved this time. Maybe because they have realised they should not be involved in the Indian constitutional process,” said working president of the Nagaland PCC Hokheto Sumi.

Sumi alleged, though, that the present government was working at the behest of the NSCN (I-M). The issue had created a furore when the Congress had raised it in the Assembly last year.

The Speaker had criticised the Congress for the remarks.

The Congress leader, however, denied any correlation between the “non-interference” and the recent NSCN (I-M) statement against the BJP.