Hans News Service Chennai

KarnatakaChief Minister D K Shivakumar on Thursday urged the Southern Zonal Council to adopt a resolution asking the Union government to honour the 1971 census for delimitation, retain 543 Lok Sabha seats for 25 years and fit women's reservation within the existing seats, while also touching upon inter-state river disputes where he stated "water must not divide us."

The meeting was chaired by Union Home Minister Amit Shah and attended by CMs of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh, C Joseph Vijay, VD Satheesan and N Chandrababu Naidu, among others.

His remarks on water comes at a time when Karnataka and neighbouring Tamil Nadu are locked in a bitter dispute over the sharing of the inter-state Cauvery river. Further, he also made a strong pitch for greater fiscal and political equity for the southern states, calling for "fairness in funds, fairness in voice and fairness in the respect owed to the states that power this economy." Shivakumar noted that south was the "engine of the Indian economy", with the five southern states accounting for nearly 33 per cent of the country's GDP despite having about 20 per cent of its population.