How many women MLAs were there in the first Legislative Assembly of Uttarakhand?
- (a)8 (Eight)
- (b)7 (Seven)
- (c)6 (Six)
- (d)4 (Four)
Correct — D, 4 (Four).
The first Legislative Assembly of Uttarakhand is the house elected on 14 February 2002, the state's first general election after its creation on 9 November 2000. Of its 70 elected members, four were women, which is why the key reads 4 (Four).
The four were Indira Hridayesh (Haldwani) and Amrita Rawat (Bironkhal) of the Congress, and Vijaya Barthwal (Yamkeshwar) and Asha Nautiyal (Kedarnath) of the BJP. Two parties, two women each, in a house where the Congress held 36 seats and formed the government under N.D. Tiwari.
The idea to carry away: the number belongs to a particular house, not to the state. Four in 2002, four in 2007, five in 2012 and 2017, eight in 2022. Fix which assembly the stem names before recalling a figure.
- (a)8 (Eight) — Eight is a real figure, but for a different house. It is the record number of women elected in 2022 to the fifth assembly, six of them from the BJP and two from the Congress.
The stem names the first assembly, not the most recent one; the house of 2002 returned half that number.
- (b)7 (Seven) — Seven does not appear in the reported series of women elected to the Uttarakhand assembly (four, four, five, five, eight). In the 2002 result it is the number of seats won by the Bahujan Samaj Party, a party tally from that election rather than a count of women.
- (c)6 (Six) — Six is a 2022 sub-total, not a 2002 figure. It is the number of BJP women elected in 2022 — six of the eight women the party fielded — while the house total that year was eight once the two Congress winners are added.
Legislative composition is counted house by house. Each general election returns a fresh Legislative Assembly, numbered in sequence, and facts such as party strength, nominated members or the number of women elected belong to that particular house rather than to the state as a whole.
For Uttarakhand the sequence starts with an interim assembly of Uttar Pradesh legislators from the region, which sat from November 2000 until the 2002 election under the Uttar Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2000. The elected house of 2002–2007 is counted as the first Legislative Assembly.
Uttarakhand's assembly has 70 elected seats and meets at Dehradun and at Bhararisain (Gairsain), declared the summer capital in 2020. Women have been a small part of it from the outset: four of 70 in 2002, rising to a high of eight in 2022, the year Ritu Khanduri Bhushan became its first woman Speaker.
The question sits where state polity meets Uttarakhand current affairs. The 106th Constitutional Amendment of 2023 reserves one-third of assembly seats for women once a delimitation follows the next census, so the low early counts are the baseline against which that change will be measured.
- Uttarakhand's first general election was held on 14 February 2002 for 70 seats; the Congress won 36 and Narayan Datt Tiwari became Chief Minister.
- The four women in the first assembly were Indira Hridayesh (Haldwani, INC), Amrita Rawat (Bironkhal, INC), Vijaya Barthwal (Yamkeshwar, BJP) and Asha Nautiyal (Kedarnath, BJP).
- Women elected in later elections, as reported at the 2022 result: four in 2007, five in 2012, five in 2017 and a record eight in 2022.
- In 2022 the BJP fielded eight women candidates and six won, while two of the Congress's five did, making up the eight.
- Ritu Khanduri Bhushan, elected from Kotdwar in 2022, became the first woman Speaker of the Uttarakhand Legislative Assembly.
- An interim assembly of Uttar Pradesh legislators from the region sat from 9 November 2000 until the 2002 election, under the Uttar Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2000.
- Yashpal Arya was Speaker of the first elected assembly (2002–2007).
- Besides 70 elected members, the assembly carried one nominated Anglo-Indian seat until the 104th Constitutional Amendment ended such nominations in January 2020.
- Asha Nautiyal, a first-assembly member for Kedarnath, returned to the house by winning the Kedarnath by-election of November 2024.
Seventy elected seats each time; the first house returned four women, the 2022 house eight.
- Recalling the 2022 headline figure of eight women and applying it to the 2002 house the stem actually names.
- Reading 'first Legislative Assembly' as the interim assembly of 2000–2002; the Vidhan Sabha counts the elected house of 2002–2007 as its first.
- Taking a party sub-total for the house total: six BJP women won in 2022, but the assembly returned eight women in all.
- Mixing rows of the 2002 result: seven was the BSP's seat tally that year, not a count of women.
The stem names a house, by number or by year, and asks for a bare figure or a name: women elected, nominated members, party seats, the Speaker.
The same fact family can be turned into 'who was the first woman Speaker', 'which election returned the most women', or 'who sat for Haldwani in the first assembly'.
The year settles the answer. Decide which house is meant, then recall that house's figure rather than the most recent one in the news.
UKPSC_2016_PRE_PaperI_Q382016Same institution and same device: the composition of the Uttarakhand Legislative Assembly reduced to a single number. The 2016 item asked how many nominated members the house had, a category of membership ended by the 104th Amendment in 2020; this one asks for women elected to the first house of 2002. Neither figure follows from the other; both reward knowing the house's make-up by year.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Which of the following women was elected to the first Legislative Assembly of Uttarakhand (2002) from the Haldwani constituency?
- (a)Amrita Rawat
- (b)Asha Nautiyal
- (c)Indira Hridayesh
- (d)Vijaya Barthwal
Answerc — Indira Hridayesh won Haldwani for the Congress in 2002 and held it again in 2012 and 2017. Amrita Rawat (a) sat for Bironkhal in that house, Asha Nautiyal (b) for Kedarnath and Vijaya Barthwal (d) for Yamkeshwar. - practice — not a real PYQ
In which general election did the Uttarakhand Legislative Assembly return its highest number of women members so far?
- (a)2007
- (b)2012
- (c)2017
- (d)2022
Answerd — The 2022 election returned eight women, the highest so far. The 2007 house (a) had four, while 2012 (b) and 2017 (c) had five each. - practice — not a real PYQ
Who was the first woman to be elected Speaker of the Uttarakhand Legislative Assembly?
- (a)Indira Hridayesh
- (b)Rekha Arya
- (c)Ritu Khanduri Bhushan
- (d)Sarita Arya
Answerc — Ritu Khanduri Bhushan, MLA for Kotdwar, was elected Speaker in March 2022. Indira Hridayesh (a) led the opposition from 2017 until her death in 2021 but did not hold the chair; Rekha Arya (b) has served as a minister in the state government; Sarita Arya (d) is the Nainital MLA.