Will Mallika perform the ’dance of victory’?

Sarabhai, who is taking on BJP’s prime ministerial candidate L K Advani as an independent from Gandhinagar, is among the six prominent women candidates in the fray from Gujarat

She has never tried to hide her disgust for the BJP, especially Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, but whether the apathy would translate into vote remains to be seen.

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Sarabhai, who is taking on BJP’s prime ministerial candidate L K Advani as an independent from Gandhinagar, is among the six prominent women candidates in the fray from Gujarat.

Mallika, daughter of noted space scientist Vikram Sarabhai and internationally acclaimed danseuse, has been a vocal critic of Modi ever since the Gujarat riots in 2002.

BJP has nominated three candidates while the Congress has fielded two in the state that has 26 Lok Sabha constituencies. Both parties had earlier announced that they would give adequate representation to women.

"BJP has always put up more number of women candidates than other parties. Ours is the only party which has given one third representation to women. This time also we have three women candidates against Congress’s two," BJP Spokesperson I K Jadeja told PTI.

The BJP had fielded women candidates from Kutch (reserved for SC), Mehsana and Surat constituency, while the Congress had put up women candidates from Dahod (reserved for ST) and Amreli.