Chennai, Aug. 24: If you can’t reserve space for women, increase the space.

That’s the suggestion Jayalalithaa has come up with as parties continue to bicker on the women’s reservation bill.

The Tamil Nadu chief minister’s formula is: increase the seats in the Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha and Assemblies by 33 per cent to accommodate women and allow sub-quotas within that.

The long-overdue reservation for women “should be provided not within the existing strength but by adding to the existing strength 33 per cent seats in the Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha and state Legislative Assemblies each”, she told reporters at the secretariat here.

But more seats would mean redrawing constituencies. So, what should be done, she added, is “without offending” the existing boundaries, the extra 33 per cent seats “must be brought in by double-member constituencies”.

In other words, one seat for electing a general member and another for electing the woman member in such designated segments.

These “double-member constituencies”, the ADMK chief said, should be decided by rotation at every level ? from Parliament to state legislatures. Within this increased 33 per cent, seats should be reserved for the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes and the backward classes.