BPSC 70th CCE Prelims General Studies · Question 5 of 143

Correct — B, Nomination of them has been done away with by 104th Constitutional Amendment. The point that makes this question worth studying is that Article 331 was never repealed. It still stands in the Constitution word for word: 'Notwithstanding anything in article 81, the President may, if he is of opinion that the Anglo-Indian community is not adequately represented in the House of the People, nominate not more than two members of that community to the House of the People.' What ended the practice is the expiry clock in Article 334, which sets a single outer time limit on two separate things — reservation of seats for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, and representation of the Anglo-Indian community by nomination. That limit began at ten years and Parliament extended it again and again: to twenty (8th Amendment, 1959), thirty (23rd, 1969), forty (45th, 1980), fifty (62nd, 1989), sixty (79th, 1999) and seventy (95th, 2009, with effect from 25 January 2010). The Constitution (One Hundred and Fourth Amendment) Act, 2019 broke the pair for the first time. It raised the limit for the SC/ST clause alone from seventy years to eighty and left the Anglo-Indian clause standing at seventy. Seventy years from the commencement of the Constitution on 26 January 1950 ran out on 25 January 2020 — the very day the 104th Amendment itself came into force, after receiving assent on 21 January 2020. From that date the President's power under Article 331 became spent while SC/ST reservation carried on to 2030. Option (b) states exactly that position, and on the date of this paper, 13 December 2024, it had been the law for nearly five years.

• (a)Two anglo-Indians are nominated by the President — This is what Article 331 says on its face, and it was the right answer to this question on any day before 25 January 2020 — which is precisely why it is the trap. The text survives; the power does not, because Article 334 set a time limit on it and the 104th Amendment declined to extend that limit. Anyone who learned the Lok Sabha's maximum strength as 530 plus 20 plus 2 nominated members, i.e. 552, is carrying the pre-2020 arithmetic.
• (c)One anglo-Indian is nominated by the President — The number one is real, but it belongs to a different House and a different authority. Article 333 allows the Governor of a State — not the President — to nominate one member of the Anglo-Indian community to that State's Legislative Assembly, reduced from an open number to exactly one by the 23rd Amendment in 1969. The option lifts the State figure and drops it into the Lok Sabha. That State provision, in any case, expired on 25 January 2020 alongside the Union one, because Article 334 covers both.
• (d)They are nominated as per their population — Never true, at any point in the Constitution's history. Article 331 turns entirely on the President's subjective opinion that the community is 'not adequately represented', with a hard ceiling of two, and mentions population nowhere. Proportionality to population belongs to a different device — reservation of seats for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes under Article 330, which is worked out in proportion to the community's share of the State's population. Mixing the two is the standard confusion this option is built on.

The Constitution gives two different kinds of protection to two different kinds of group, and the Anglo-Indian provisions exist because the community fits neither of the usual moulds. Article 366(2) defines an Anglo-Indian as 'a person whose father or any of whose other male progenitors in the male line is or was of European descent but who is domiciled within the territory of India and is or was born within such territory of parents habitually resident therein' — the only community the Constitution defines by descent. Being scattered across the country rather than concentrated in any district, it could not be helped by reserving a territorial constituency, which is what Articles 330 and 332 do for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. So the framers used nomination instead: up to two seats in the Lok Sabha under Article 331 and one in each State Assembly under Article 333. They paired it with two other transitional protections that tapered on their own — Article 336 kept the community's existing share of railway, customs, postal and telegraph posts but cut it by ten per cent every two years until it ceased after ten years, and Article 337 did the same for educational grants over three-year steps. Every one of these was built to end.

This is a 'what is the position now' question rather than a 'what does the Article say' question, and the two have had different answers since January 2020. Work it from the date. The paper was sat on 13 December 2024; the 104th Amendment took effect on 25 January 2020; so anything describing an active nomination power is describing a lapsed one. The three wrong options each fail in a distinct way that is worth naming, because BPSC recycles all three. Option (a) is the correct pre-2020 text. Option (c) borrows the State Assembly number under Article 333 and misattributes it to the President. Option (d) imports the population logic of SC/ST reservation into a provision that never had it. One further check is worth carrying: with the two nominated seats gone, the maximum strength of the Lok Sabha under Article 81 is 550 — not more than 530 members from the States and not more than 20 from the Union territories — rather than the 552 that older textbooks still print.

• Article 331 is still in the Constitution and reads, verbatim: 'Notwithstanding anything in article 81, the President may, if he is of opinion that the Anglo-Indian community is not adequately represented in the House of the People, nominate not more than two members of that community to the House of the People.'
• Article 334, as amended by the Constitution (104th Amendment) Act, 2019 — assent 21 January 2020, in force 25 January 2020 — sets the cut-off at eighty years from the commencement of the Constitution for SC/ST reservation of seats and seventy years for Anglo-Indian nomination. Seventy years ran out on 25 January 2020; SC/ST reservation runs to 25 January 2030.
• The extension history of Article 334: thirty years in the original text, then forty (45th Amendment, 1980), fifty (62nd, 1989), sixty (79th, 1999) and seventy (95th, 2009, w.e.f. 25 January 2010). The 104th is the first amendment to treat the two clauses differently.
• Article 333 is the State twin: a Governor may nominate one member of the Anglo-Indian community to a State Legislative Assembly — the figure was cut from an open number to one by the 23rd Amendment, 1969 — and it lapsed on the same date, 25 January 2020.
• Article 366(2) defines an Anglo-Indian by descent in the male line from a European, coupled with domicile and birth in India; it is the only community the Constitution defines by descent.
• With the nominated seats gone, the ceiling on the Lok Sabha under Article 81 is 550: not more than 530 members directly elected from territorial constituencies in the States, and not more than 20 representing the Union territories.

• Quoting Article 331 as the current position. The Article survives in the text; what expired is the Article 334 time limit it operates under, which is a distinction BPSC and UPSC both like to test.
• Mixing up the numbers: two for the Lok Sabha under Article 331 by the President, one for a State Assembly under Article 333 by the Governor.
• Carrying 552 as the Lok Sabha's maximum strength. That figure included the two Anglo-Indian nominees; since January 2020 the ceiling under Article 81 is 550.

BPSC asks for the current position in one line and expects you to know the amendment number — this stem prints '104th' inside the correct option, so recognising that the 104th Amendment is the Anglo-Indian and SC/ST seat amendment is the whole question. UPSC prefers to bury the same fact inside a statement set or a 'which of the following is correct' list, where the Anglo-Indian nomination appears as a wrong option because it has been attached to the Rajya Sabha, or made automatic, or extended to other minorities.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Under Article 333 of the Constitution, how many members of the Anglo-Indian community could be nominated to a State Legislative Assembly, and by whom ?

  • (a)Two, by the President
  • (b)One, by the Governor
  • (c)Two, by the Governor
  • (d)One, by the Speaker of the Assembly

  Answer(b) One, by the Governor — Article 333 empowered the Governor to nominate one member of the community if he thought it needed representation; the number was cut from an open figure to one by the 23rd Amendment, 1969. The provision lapsed on 25 January 2020.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Constitution (One Hundred and Fourth Amendment) Act, 2019 extended the reservation of seats for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes up to which year ?

  • (a)2025
  • (b)2030
  • (c)2035
  • (d)2040

  Answer(b) 2030 — the amendment raised the Article 334 limit for SC/ST reservation from seventy years to eighty years from the commencement of the Constitution, i.e. to 25 January 2030, while leaving the Anglo-Indian clause to expire at seventy years in January 2020.