By which amendment of the Constitution, 'Delhi' has been made National Capital Region ?

Question

UnlockIAS · Accepted Answer

Correct — B, 69th. The Constitution (Sixty-ninth Amendment) Act, 1991, brought into force on 1 February 1992, inserted Articles 239AA and 239AB and gave Delhi the special status it has held ever since. Article 239AA renamed the Union Territory of Delhi the NATIONAL CAPITAL TERRITORY of Delhi and provided it with a Legislative Assembly of 70 elected seats and a Council of Ministers headed by a Chief Minister, with power to make laws on the State List and the Concurrent List except for three reserved subjects — public order, police and land. Article 239AB is the provision for suspending that machinery, the equivalent of President's rule for Delhi. The amendment was accompanied by the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi Act, 1991. Note the wording of the stem: the 69th Amendment made Delhi the National Capital TERRITORY, not the National Capital REGION. The National Capital Region is a completely different creature — a statutory PLANNING region set up under the National Capital Region Planning Board Act, 1985, which covers Delhi together with adjoining districts of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, and which owes nothing to any constitutional amendment. The commission's key is unaffected by the slip: since no amendment created the NCR at all, the 69th remains the only defensible answer to the question as intended, and 'Territory' is what a student should carry away.

Why the other options are wrong — (a) The Constitution (Seventy-third Amendment) Act, 1992 is the panchayat amendment. It inserted Part IX and the Eleventh Schedule and made three-tier rural local government a constitutional requirement with regular elections, reservation of seats and State Finance Commissions. It has nothing to do with Delhi's status.  (c) The Constitution (Seventy-fifth Amendment) Act, 1994 amended Article 323B to let States set up tribunals for rent, tenancy and eviction disputes. It is an administrative-tribunals amendment, not a territorial or capital-city one.  (d) The nearest neighbour and therefore the sharpest trap. The Constitution (Seventieth Amendment) Act belongs to the same cluster and also concerns Delhi — it amended Article 54 so that the elected members of the Legislative Assemblies of the National Capital Territory of Delhi and of Puducherry count in the electoral college for the election of the President. But it presupposes the Assembly that the 69th Amendment had already created; it did not itself confer Delhi's special status.

Concept: Delhi occupies a category of its own in the Constitution. It is not a State, so it has no Governor and no Article 246 competence of its own; but it is not an ordinary Union Territory either, because Article 239AA gives it an elected legislature and a responsible Council of Ministers. The three subjects held back — public order, police and land — are precisely the ones that make it a capital city administered ultimately by the Union, and they are the standing source of friction between the elected government and the Lieutenant Governor. Puducherry has a comparable but statutory arrangement under the Government of Union Territories Act, 1963, which is why the two are so often paired in questions.

State PCS 2022 Q83 — Polity & Governance PYQ with Answer

State PCS 2022 Q83 — Polity & Governance PYQ with Answer