Mayawati, a schoolteacher turned politician, is India's best-known leader of Dalit, or low-caste, groups.
Ms Mayawati vies to be a national figure, perhaps even India's first dalit prime minister.
Voters will soon have their say, as Ms Mayawati must call state elections within months.
Meanwhile, Chief Minister Mayawati has announced a month-long campaign focusing on crimes against women.
Most believe that Mr Gandhi is right to take on Ms Mayawati on the issues of governance.
Ms Mayawati, a former primary-school teacher, is known for her love of diamonds and dalit-sized garlands of banknotes.
But Sarika says Ms Mayawati's words mean little to her until all her attackers are caught and punished.
Mayawati has always denied any knowledge of the building project, which was abandoned after a public outcry in July.
Even her worst critics will agree that Ms Mayawati and her party have contributed to significant empowerment of the Dalits.
Former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh state and low-caste Dalit leader Mayawati said that he should be "sent to jail".
It won't be easy despite what critics call a record of misrule by the remote Mayawati, an icon for India's Dalits.
As with most politicians, Ms Mayawati's record in power has been mixed.
Miss Mayawati's only discernible policy has been the promotion of Dalit interests.
Sarju has travelled to several of her rallies, and speaks of the dalit queen, as Ms Mayawati is sometimes called, with awe.
But the high court has directed Ms Mayawati to co-operate with the investigators and also not leave the country without seeking its permission.
The high court in Uttar Pradesh has ruled that the state's former chief minister, Mayawati, should not be arrested until an investigation is completed.
Ms Mayawati has splurged taxpayers' money in building expensive statues.
And the inspiration many dalits find in Ms Mayawati is impressive.
Now the Central Bureau of Investigation hints that it will at last prosecute Ms Mayawati for corruption over evidence of huge growth in her personal assets.
Under four-and-a-half years of Ms Mayawati's rule, the state has recorded an average of over 7% growth a year, a tad less than India's average of 8.15%.
Mayawati, chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, which is India's largest state and one of its poorest, with 170m people, has been quick to demand that it be carved into four.
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Mayawati, Jayalalithaa and Banerjee have suffered even physical assaults by uncouth rivals, a remarkable pattern that reveals how high the odds are stacked against women politicians in India.
They include three women: Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal, Jayaram Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu and Mayawati, a Dalit (the lowest caste) who ruled UP until earlier this year.
He blames Congress's opponent, the state's populist chief minister, Mayawati.
Since the 2004 general election, Mayawati's fortunes have soared.
While Ms Mayawati partied in the park, television news showed underfunded health workers in eastern UP struggling to combat an outbreak of encephalitis that has recently killed several hundred people, mostly children.
About 150 furious supporters of Ms Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) then marched to Ms Joshi's house in the state capital, Lucknow, and set it on fire, reports the BBC's Ram Dutt Tripathi.
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