Arunachal Pradesh Holds 50,394 Megawatts of India's Exploitable Large Hydropower, 37.8 Per Cent of the National Total, and Reserves 59 of Its 60 Assembly Seats for Scheduled Tribes

A Ministry of Power table of state-wise hydropower, current to 30 June 2024, puts Arunachal Pradesh’s exploitable potential from large schemes (those above 25 megawatts) at 50,394 megawatts. The figure for all of India in the same table is 1,33,410 megawatts, so the state holds 37.8 per cent of it, by tuput’s division of the two numbers.

The state covers 83,743 square kilometres, according to the Government of Arunachal Pradesh’s portal, and had 13,83,727 residents at the 2011 Census. That census is the source of the population figures here because the next one is still under way. The capital is Itanagar.

From a frontier agency to statehood on 20 February 1987

Until 1972 the area was the North-East Frontier Agency, known as NEFA. The North-Eastern Areas (Reorganisation) Act, 1971 describes it as the tribal areas listed in Part B of the table under paragraph 20 of the Sixth Schedule (the Constitution’s rules for self-governing tribal districts), then part of Assam. The Act, dated 30 December 1971, formed them into the Union territory of Arunachal Pradesh, an area the Centre administers directly. A notification of 6 January 1972 fixed the appointed day as 21 January 1972.

The State of Arunachal Pradesh Act, 1986 (Act 69 of 1986) made it a state from 20 February 1987, under a notification of 11 February 1987. The Constitution (Fifty-fifth Amendment) Act, 1986 inserted Article 371H with effect from the same day, as Article 371G did for Mizoram. Until the first elections, the Union territory’s existing Assembly, with its elected and nominated members, served as the state’s provisional Assembly. Our explainer on Article 371 sets out the other states with provisions of this kind.

How the state is governed

Section 10 of the 1986 Act, in the form substituted by Act 52 of 1988 from 27 September 1988, fixes the Legislative Assembly at 60 directly elected seats and reserves 59 of them for Scheduled Tribes. The Representation of the People Act, 1950 shows no seat reserved for Scheduled Castes. Article 332(3A) of the Constitution is the rule behind this: where every seat in a state’s earlier Assembly was held by a Scheduled Tribe member, all seats but one are reserved, until seats are readjusted on the basis of the first census after 2026.

Article 371H sets a floor, saying the Assembly “shall consist of not less than thirty members”. The Statement of Objects and Reasons of 1 December 1986 had proposed 40.

The same article gives the Governor special responsibility for law and order. On that subject the Governor consults the Council of Ministers and then acts on individual judgment, and the Governor’s own decision on whether a matter falls under the duty is final. The President may end the responsibility by order. The Statement of Objects cites the state’s sensitive location. Our guide to what a Governor does covers the powers the Governor holds in every state.

Arunachal Pradesh sends two members to the Lok Sabha, neither seat reserved, and one to the Rajya Sabha, under the 1950 Act and the Constitution’s Fourth Schedule. It has one chamber: the Third Schedule of the 1950 Act lists the states with Legislative Councils, and Arunachal Pradesh is not among them. The state portal gives 28 districts.

Section 18 of the 1986 Act placed the state under a common Gauhati High Court with Assam, Nagaland, Meghalaya, Manipur, Tripura and Mizoram. Section 24 lets the President create permanent benches and lets the Chief Justice, with the Governor’s approval, sit elsewhere in the states.

At village level, the Assembly voted on 15 March 2018 to abolish the Anchal Samiti, the middle tier of its panchayats, leaving Gram Panchayats and Zilla Parishads. Article 243B(2) lets a state of 20 lakh people or fewer skip the intermediate level, and the Panchayat Minister of the day cited the state’s 13.84 lakh residents, the Morung Express reported. Article 243M(3A) separately says the Constitution’s rule reserving panchayat seats for Scheduled Castes does not apply to Arunachal Pradesh.

What the economy rests on

PRS Legislative Research, using the state’s budget papers, estimates per capita GSDP (gross state domestic product, the value of a state’s output divided by its population) at Rs 3,09,994 for 2025-26, against Rs 2,51,393 for India, about 23 per cent higher. It puts real growth that year at 10 per cent against 7.4 per cent for the country. At current prices agriculture makes up 27 per cent of the economy, manufacturing 21 per cent and services 52 per cent.

The Deputy Chief Minister presented the 2026-27 budget on 10 March 2026. Of revenue receipts of Rs 30,733 crore, PRS reports that Rs 5,208 crore (17 per cent) is the state’s own and Rs 25,525 crore (83 per cent) comes from the Centre, 67 per cent as its share of central taxes and 16 per cent as grants. The Sixteenth Finance Commission found that devolution and Union transfers supplied 87 per cent of the state’s revenue receipts in 2023-24. PRS says the budgeted revenue surplus of 9 per cent of GSDP “stems from significant central transfers relative to a low GSDP base”. Our comparison of state finances puts these ratios beside other states.

Hydropower is the resource the state is known for, and most of it is still unbuilt. A Rajya Sabha reply of 3 February 2025 gives Arunachal Pradesh 1,115 megawatts of installed large hydro on 31 December 2024, about 2 per cent of the 50,394 megawatts of potential. The 2,000-megawatt Subansiri Lower project, on the Subansiri River at the Arunachal Pradesh and Assam border, has eight units of 250 megawatts each. The Ministry of Power said on 16 March 2026 that two were commissioned and the rest were planned in phases until December 2026.

Roads carry the other large public project. The Border Roads Organisation built the Sela Tunnel at 13,000 feet on the Tezpur to Tawang road in West Kameng district, using the Austrian Tunnelling Method. The Prime Minister dedicated it on 9 March 2024 at a cost of Rs 825 crore. Construction began on 1 April 2019, and the Press Information Bureau says it was finished in five years. The Atal Tunnel piece describes the engineering of a comparable Himalayan crossing.

What sets Arunachal Pradesh apart

Scheduled Tribe residents numbered 9,51,821 at the 2011 Census, 68.8 per cent of the state’s population by tuput’s arithmetic. The Census table lists 104 tribe entries, some of them sub-groups counted apart from the larger tribe. The largest entry is the Nyishi at 2,49,824, roughly a quarter of the Scheduled Tribe total, followed by the Galo (79,327) and the Adi (67,869).

In the Assembly table of the Representation of the People Act, only Nagaland matches Arunachal Pradesh’s pattern of 59 of 60 seats reserved for Scheduled Tribes and none for Scheduled Castes. Mizoram reserves 39 of 40 and Meghalaya 55 of 60. The Ministry of Power table ranks Arunachal Pradesh first for hydropower by a wide margin, ahead of Himachal Pradesh’s 18,305 megawatts.

The state’s northern frontier is also a matter on which two governments disagree. Business Today reported on 4 April 2023 that India’s Ministry of External Affairs had said Arunachal Pradesh is an “integral and inalienable part of India”. China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on 14 April 2026 that the “Zangnan region is China’s territory” and that China does not recognise the state as set up by India. He was answering a question about a sixth batch of names that China’s Ministry of Civil Affairs published on 10 April 2026. This article records both positions as the two governments state them.

What comes next

The Vibrant Villages Programme, approved on 15 February 2023, covers 46 blocks in 19 districts along the northern border. The Ministry of Home Affairs told the Lok Sabha on 3 February 2026 that 2,558 works worth Rs 3,431 crore had been sanctioned across the four states and the Union territory of Ladakh that it covers, 2,082 of them, worth Rs 2,749.74 crore, in Arunachal Pradesh. The reply says no impact assessment has been carried out, and that the state government has reported people returning to villages in Kurung Kumey, Dibang Valley and Shi-Yomi.

Seat boundaries are the other open item. Section 8A of the 1950 Act lets the President lift a deferment of delimitation in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur or Nagaland, after which the Election Commission redraws the constituencies. On 17 March 2025 the Supreme Court gave the Union three months to report the steps taken in these states, with particular focus on Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland, LiveLaw reported. The petitioners rely on a President’s order of 2020 that lifted the deferment. The delimitation guide explains why boundary changes follow the census.

For money, the Sixteenth Finance Commission gives Arunachal Pradesh 1.354 per cent of the states’ share of central taxes for 2026-31 in its Table 8.9. PRS estimates the state’s share in central taxes for 2026-27 at Rs 20,665 crore, 16 per cent below the revised figure for 2025-26, which it says may reflect the lower share the Commission recommended.