The Supreme Court has directed the National Commission for Minorities (NCM) to decide within three months on a representation seeking guidelines for redefining the term 'minority' based on state-wise population. A bench, headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, told the lawyer Ashwini Upadhyay to re-file his representation to NCM, asking the minority panel to take a decision as early as possible, preferably within three months.<br />''<br />''<span style="color: #222222;">The lawyer, in his plea, said, the term minority needed to be redefined and reconsidered in the context of population of a community in a state, instead of nationwide population data. The plea said Hindus, who are a majority community as per national data, are a minority in several north-eastern states and in Jammu and Kashmir. The plea added that the Hindu community is deprived of benefits which are available to the minority communities in these states, hence NCM should reconsider the definition of minority.</span><br />