Britain’s hearing impaired beauty cops Miss India Worldwide 2013

May 06, 2013 News

Britain’s Nehal Bhogaita has won the title of Miss India Worldwide, making her the first deaf to win the beauty pageant which was held in Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia last week

Miss India Worldwide 2013, Nehal Bhogaita

According to online reports, she is also the first deaf contestant in the pageant’s history, and aspires to be a role model for the deaf and disabled.
The first runner-up was Jasveer Kaur Sandhu of Malaysia, who was followed by Surbhi Sachdev of Oman. The other two finalists in the top five were Geetanjali Kelath of UAE and Ayushi Chhabra of Nigeria.
Guyana was represented by the beautiful Katherina Roshana, daughter of Roshan Khan, who did not place.
Roshana was chosen to represent Guyana during a mere audition before a panel of judges and one media representative.
For the talent segment of the competition, Bhogaita performed a Bollywood dance routine by feeling the vibrations of the music. Her dancing has already made her famous in Great Britain, where she has participated in the TV show “Just Dance”, and the NRI show “Boogie Woogie.”
Malaysian news reports have said that Bhogaita’s performance was a highlight of her own conviction of never giving up.
Bhogaita is also an activist with Action Deafness, an NGO for whom she leads a dance project teaching deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals to dance.
It is most likely that last year’s first runner-up would have crowned Bhogaita, as Guyana’s Alana Seebarran, Miss India Worldwide 2012, was asked not to attend the event. She has been thus far, Guyana’s first International beauty queen.
This move by Miss India Worldwide Committee has raised many eyebrows, especially since it was made clear to Seebarran that she was not being stripped of her title.
So it appears as though Seebarran might have only been stripped of her right as the then reigning queen, to crown her successor.
This move by the International committee might have stemmed from a nasty conflict that has been ongoing between Seebarran and Franchise Holder of the Miss India Guyana, Chandini Ramnarine, and her sister Lucria Rambalak.
The conflict erupted here in Guyana after a YouTube video of Rambalak being interviewed by the Indian media, went viral.
Apparently, the video portrayed Rambalak as somewhat impersonating the queen. However, following media reports about the video, Ramnarine issued a public statement saying that the mix up occurred with the media representatives in India, who mistook Rambalak for the Miss India Worldwide.
Alana Seebarran has since sued both Ramnarine and Rambalak for $50M. In papers obtained from the Supreme Court Registry, Georgetown, Seebarran is alleging that Chandini Ramnarine failed to discharge contractual and fiduciary duties owed to her. And, the claim against Rambalak, who was selected by her sister to be Miss India Guyana 2010, is for impersonation and “passing off”.