In the Presidential election in India, every elected member of the Legislative Assembly of a State shall have as many votes as there are multiples of one thousand in the quotient obtained by dividing the population of the State by the total number of the elected members of the Assembly. As at present (1997) the expression “population” here means the population as ascertained by the

1. The value of votes for MLAs in the Presidential election in India is calculated based on the population of the respective State, according to Article 55 of the Constitution. 2. The Constitution specifies which census data should be used for this calculation. 3. The 42nd Amendment Act, 1976, mandated that for the purposes of Article 55 (and allocation of seats in Lok Sabha), the population would mean the population as ascertained by the 1971 Census. 4. This freeze was initially set until the figures from the first census after the year 2000 were available. 5. Therefore, as of 1997, the population figures used in the formula for MLA vote value in the Presidential election were those from the 1971 Census. (This freeze was later extended by the 84th Amendment until after the first census post-2026).