According to the Delimitation Commission of India and subject to Article 333 of the Constitution of India, what is the maximum number of members that a State Legislative Assembly may have?

Correct — B, 500. Article 170(1) of the Constitution fixes the size of a State Legislative Assembly at not more than five hundred and not less than sixty members, chosen by direct election from territorial constituencies. Five hundred is therefore the ceiling for every State, and no Assembly has come near it — Uttar Pradesh, the largest, has 403 seats. The floor of sixty is relaxed for several small States by special provision, which is why Sikkim has 32, and Goa, Mizoram and the Union Territory of Puducherry sit in the forties and thirties. Delimitation redraws constituency boundaries within a State on the basis of census figures, but it works inside this constitutional ceiling and cannot raise it.

• (a)450 — Not a figure the Constitution uses anywhere for a Legislative Assembly. It is below Article 170's ceiling and above the strength of every existing Assembly, so it corresponds to nothing.
• (c)550 — This is the Lok Sabha's ceiling, not a State Assembly's — Article 81 caps the House of the People at 530 members from the States plus not more than 20 from the Union Territories. Carrying the Union figure across to a State is the mistake the option is built for.
• (d)600 — No House in the Indian system has a ceiling of six hundred. It reads as a round number chosen to sit above the two real ones.

Three ceilings are worth holding together. A State Legislative Assembly is capped at 500 and floored at 60 by Article 170. The Lok Sabha is capped by Article 81 at 530 members from the States and 20 from the Union Territories. A Legislative Council, where one exists, is capped by Article 171 at one-third of the Assembly's strength and floored at 40. The numbers 500, 550 and 40 are the ones examiners rotate.

The stem's reference to Article 333 is loose and worth reading carefully rather than trusting. Article 333 dealt with the Governor's power to nominate one member of the Anglo-Indian community to a State Assembly, over and above the elected strength; the ceiling of 500 lives in Article 170, not in 333. The nomination provision itself has since gone — the 104th Constitutional Amendment let it lapse with effect from 25 January 2020, so by the time this paper was set the Anglo-Indian seat no longer existed in any Assembly or in the Lok Sabha. The 500 ceiling is unaffected and remains the answer.

• Article 170(1) caps a State Legislative Assembly at 500 members and floors it at 60, all directly elected.
• Uttar Pradesh has the largest Assembly at 403 seats; Sikkim's 32 and Goa's 40 sit below the ordinary floor under special provisions.
• Article 81 caps the Lok Sabha at 530 members from the States and not more than 20 from the Union Territories.
• Article 171 caps a Legislative Council at one-third of the Assembly's strength, with a floor of 40.
• The Anglo-Indian nomination under Articles 331 and 333 lapsed on 25 January 2020 under the 104th Constitutional Amendment Act, 2019.

• Carrying the Lok Sabha's 550 across to a State Assembly.
• Taking the article number quoted in a stem at face value; the 500 ceiling is in Article 170, not 333.
• Forgetting that several small States sit legally below the floor of sixty.

Asked as a bare numerical recall, with the Lok Sabha's ceiling offered alongside the Assembly's — the standard way this pair of numbers is tested.

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Under Article 171 of the Constitution, the strength of a State Legislative Council shall not exceed

  • (a)one-half of the strength of the Legislative Assembly
  • (b)one-third of the strength of the Legislative Assembly
  • (c)one-fourth of the strength of the Legislative Assembly
  • (d)one hundred members

  Answer(b) one-third of the strength of the Legislative Assembly — subject to a floor of 40 members.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The maximum strength of the Lok Sabha as fixed by Article 81 of the Constitution is

  • (a)500 members
  • (b)530 members
  • (c)545 members
  • (d)550 members

  Answer(d) 550 members — not more than 530 from the States and not more than 20 from the Union Territories.