Miss Grand Mauritius

Miss Grand Mauritius licensee timeline

Miss Grand Mauritius is a national beauty pageant title awarded to Mauritian representatives competing at the Miss Grand International contest.^[1][2][3][4] The title was first awarded in 2014 to an interior designer and model, Dolesswaree Charun,^[1][5] and that year's licensee was Raj Ramrachia of the Miss India Mauritius pageant.^[5][6] However, Charun failed to qualify for the semifinal round on the international stage held in Thailand on October 7, 2014.^[7]

The license of Miss Grand Mauritius was transferred to the Miss Supranational Mauritius organizer, Miss Earth Mauritius pageant, and Ahmad-Abbas Ltd. in 2015, 2016, and 2019, respectively.^[3][8][9] Still, most of the country representatives were appointed; no Miss Grand National was held,^[2][3][9] the country representative was directly elected through the contest only in 2021 when the pageant named Ahmad-Abbas Pageant Show was organized to select the Mauritian candidate for Miss Grand International specifically.^[10]

Since the first competition in 2014, the highest and only placement of Mauritian representatives in the Miss Grand International contest was the final 10, obtained in 2022 by an appointed Yuvna Rinishta after she won the Miss Popular Vote and automatically qualified for the mentioned position.^[11] On the occasion of celebrating the pageant's first decade anniversary, Yuvna was also assumed to be the 5th runner-up,^[12][13] but was forced to resign three days later due to her inability to sign a contract with the international body as well as the conflict between the Mauritian national director and the international organizer.^[14][15][16]

History

Mauritius debuted in Miss Grand International in 2014 and was represented by Dolesswaree Charun,^[1][5] who was previously placed as one of the top 10 finalists at the Miss India Mauritius 2014 pageant and was subsequently assigned by the national organizer to represent the country at the Miss Grand International 2014 pageant in Thailand.^[5][6] A year later, the license was transferred to Ameeksha Dilchand, the director of Miss Supranational Mauritius;^[8][17] however, due to her inability to send a Mauritian candidate to compete internationally, the license was handed over to Miss Earth Mauritius organizer William Madarassou, the following year.^[9] No Mauritian candidates at Miss Grand International in 2017 and 2018 due to no licensees.

After two consecutive years of absence, the Miss Grand Mauritius franchise was granted by Ahmad Abbas Mamode's model agency company, Ahmad-Abbas Ltd.,^[18][3] which served as the licensee body from 2019 to 2022.^[3] During such a period, most of the country representatives at Miss Grand International were directly hand-picked by the national director,^[2][3][9] except for 2021, when the newly established contest of the Ahmad-Abbas Pageant Show was organized and the main winner was sent to compete in Miss Grand International 2021 in Thailand, while the vice-misses were sent to other international platforms, such as Miss Eco International and Miss Planet International.^[10] The partnership between Ahmad-Abbas Ltd. and Miss Grand International PLC was discontinued in late 2022 as a result of the conflict after the 2022 International coronation night in Indonesia.^[12][13][14]

International competition

The following is a list of Mauritian representatives at the Miss Grand International contest.

Titleholders gallery

• 
  Miss Grand Mauritius 2014
  Dolesswaree Charun
• 
  Miss Grand Mauritius 2021
  Naomi Buan
• 
  Miss Grand Mauritius 2022
  Yuvna Rinishta

Controversy

2022 Delegitimisation

On October 28, 2022, three days after the Miss Grand International 2022 coronation night, the pageant organizer released an official statement on their Facebook page dethroning Miss Grand Mauritius, Yuvna Rinishta, who had previously won the Miss Popular Vote then was automatically placed among the top 10 finalists (also assumed the 5th runners-up) and was also required to sign a contract to work with the organization until January 2023. According to the aforementioned announcement, Miss Mauritius decided to resign from the title due to her inability to sign the contract and complete the duty as the 5th runner-up, therefore she could no longer use the title with immediate effect.^{[14][15][16][26]}

However, the Miss Grand Mauritius organizer, Ahmad Abbas, thereupon publicized an argument on the national pageant's social media claiming that the content previously published by the Miss Grand International organization caused a misunderstanding, despite the fact that Miss Yuvna had already received a resignation document but did not sign it and disagreed with the content mentioned in the document.^[27][28] The reason given for the incident is that the vision of the international organization does not correspond to that of the Miss Grand Mauritius pageant.^[29] Abbas also requested the international organizer stop publishing such a misleading statement.^[15][26][28]

According to the Miss Grand International chairperson's statement, which was published by several Thai online newspapers, including Daily News and Siam Rath, cited that the Mauritian national director, who stay with Miss Mauritius in Thailand and Indonesia for three months of training prior to entering the international contest,^[30][31] requested to closely monitor the country's representative during the entire pageant duty period after she had been elected the 5th runner-up, but the international firm refused. A problem-solving negotiation occurred, but no mutual agreements were achieved. The national director also refused to allow Miss Mauritius to sign a contract with Miss Grand International and asked that she returns to the country, causing the international organizer to demand Miss Mauritius resign,^{[12][13][32][33]} and later assigned the Philippines representative, Roberta Tamondong, as the replacement.^[34]

References

External links

Media related to Miss Grand Mauritius at Wikimedia Commons