Arundhati (अरुन्धती) is the Sanskrit name of **the star Alcor in Ursa Major — the wife of the sage Vasishta, both visible in the sky as the double star Mizar-Alcor**. **In Hindu tradition, Arundhati is the model of wifely fidelity**; in the Sapta Rishi (Seven Sages) constellation she is the only female figure. **Arundhati Roy (born 1961)** — the **Indian novelist whose debut *The God of Small Things* (1997) won the Booker Prize** and has sold over 8 million copies worldwide. **Activist against the Narmada dam project, nuclear weapons, and Hindu nationalism**; her *Walking with the Comrades* (2010) and *The Doctor and the Saint* (2014) reshaped Indian non-fiction.
Subject of countless Indian astronomical and literary texts.
Arundhati reduces to eight — the number of sage's star wife.