"I always exercise my right to vote and it is also my duty to the country,"
Heads turned and people smiled as the world's shortest woman, Jyoti Kishanji Amge, turned up to cast her vote in the Lok Sabha elections, here on Friday morning.
A beaming but tad shy, Jyoti - who is all of 62.8 cm (2 feet, ¾ inch) tall - arrived with her family members carrying her in arms to avoid the huge crowds at the polling station in a school near her home.
As soon as she reached the venue, attired in a glowing red Barbie-style dress, wearing blood-red lipstick and some trinkets on her fingers and wrists, the paparazzi virtually mobbed her till she entered the polling booth, giggling at all the commotion and attention lavished on her.
"This is my second Lok Sabha election voting, and I have already voted twice, even for the Maharashtra Assembly elections... I always exercise my right to vote and it is also my duty to the country," a thrilled Jyoti told IANS after casting her vote, proudly displaying her tiny inked finger to the media.
Just last month, as a global celeb in her own (birth)right, Nagpur-born Jyoti had made a fervent appeal on behalf of the Election Commission of India (ECI) and Maharashtra Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), urging people to vote.
"Voting is our duty and right... With our vote, we can ensure that we elect a good leader to represent us," said the 30-year-old petite dame, who is the Brand Ambassador for Missionsky India Human Rights Association.
Incidentally, on her 18th birthday on December 16, 2011, Jyoti was officially declared the shortest living woman on the planet by the Guinness World Records, catapulting her to instant stardom, and making her a darling of India's Orange City.
Her vertical growth is stunted owing to a genetic condition called 'primordial dwarfism', but she has stood tall and worked in Indian and Hollywood films, and television shows. She was the subject of documentaries and media articles world over.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)