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Parliament of India

Supreme legislative body of the Republic of India

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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 16, 2026
Entity authorityQ695252 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Parliament of India (ISO: Bhāratīya Saṁsada) is the supreme legislative body of the Republic of India. It is a bicameral legislature composed of the Rajya Sabha (Council of States) and the Lok Sabha (House of the People). The President of India, in their role as head of the legislature, has full powers to summon and prorogue either house of Parliament or to dissolve the Lok Sabha, but they can exercise these powers only upon the advice of the Prime Minister of India and the Central Council of Ministers who sit in and answer to Parliament and form the Government of India.

Those elected or nominated (by the president) to either house of the Parliament are referred to as members of Parliament (MPs). The members of parliament in the Lok Sabha are directly elected by the voting of Indian citizens in single-member districts and the members of parliament in the Rajya Sabha are elected by the members of all state legislative assemblies by proportional representation. The Parliament has a sanctioned strength of 543 in the Lok Sabha and 245 in the Rajya Sabha including 12 nominees from the expertise of different fields of literature, art, science, and social service. The Parliament meets at Sansad Bhavan in New Delhi. The Parliament of India represents the largest democratic electorate in the world (the second being the European Parliament), with an electorate of 968 million eligible voters in 2024. On 28 May 2023, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, unveiled and inaugurated the New Parliament Building (Sansad Bhavan), located adjacent to the previous one.

History

During the British rule, the legislative branch of India was the Imperial Legislative Council, which was created in 1861 via the Indian Councils Act 1861 and disbanded in 1947, when India gained independence.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Parliament of India” as supreme legislative body of the Republic of India. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2024, 2023, 1861, 1947—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1951-01-01. The account is most persuasive where Parliament, India and Supreme can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as supreme legislative body of the Republic of India. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q695252. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2024, 2023, 1861 and 1947.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Parliament of India”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Parliament of India primary sources, Parliament of India archive and Parliament research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Parliament of India”?
  2. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
  3. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Parliament of India” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.