"Delimitation of Lok Sabha constituencies need not entail enlargement of the House." Critically examine this view in light of constitutional provisions and past legislative precedent.

Article 81 requires representation to be proportional to population only "so far as practicable," and Article 82 mandates readjustment after each Census — not expansion. With the seat freeze due to lapse after the first Census following 2026, the view has real constitutional footing, though it is not free of difficulty.

Constitutional and precedential support for the view

• Text is permissive: Article 82 obliges Parliament to readjust allocation and constituency boundaries; the number of seats is a ceiling fixed by Article 81, which Parliament may leave untouched.
• Twin precedents: the 42nd Amendment (1976) froze inter-State allocation on the 1971 Census, and the 84th Amendment (2001) extended it to the first Census after 2026 — Parliament twice subordinated strict arithmetic to the national goal of population stabilisation [2].
• Federal balance: population-based enlargement shifts weight to high-growth States like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar while Kerala and Tamil Nadu lose relative voice, penalising demographic success [3].
• Women's reservation is number-neutral: the one-third quota under the 2023 Amendment operates on whatever strength exists; it needs a delimitation exercise, not a bigger House [4].

Critical limitations

• A five-decade freeze has produced severe malapportionment, diluting the "one person, one vote" equality that animates Article 81.
• Holding at 543 forces some States to lose seats in absolute terms — politically harder than expansion, which is why the Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill, 2026 proposed raising the cap from 550 to 850 [2].
• India's MP-to-citizen ratio is among the world's highest, straining constituency representation.
• Either route needs an Article 368 special majority; the Bill's defeat on 17 April 2026 shows consensus is the true constraint, not text [1][2].

Delimitation is therefore constitutionally separable from enlargement — 543 can be internally rearranged. The durable path lies in consensus-building through an inclusive delimitation commission, transitional safeguards for States that stabilised population, and early operationalisation of women's reservation, so that representational equality and federal trust advance together.