Tamil Nadi girl Anukreethy Vas won the 55th Femina Miss India World 2018 title on Tuesday. Meenakshi Chaudhary from Haryana and Shreya Rao from Andhra Pradesh were adjudged first and second runners-up, respectively, at the gala show held in Mumbai.
Miss World 2017 Manushi Chhillar crowned her successor Anukreethy at the star-studded grand finale held at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Indoor Stadium in Mumbai on Tuesday night.
Raised by a single mother, Anukreethy Vas, 19, is a student of Chennai’s Loyola College. She is pursuing BA in French and wants to become an interpreter. The new Miss India World 2018 loves to face the camera and wishes to become a supermodel.
Participants were judged on their aptitude as they faced some tricky questions from the judges’ panel which included actors Bobby Deol, Kunal Kapoor, Malaika Arora, fashion designer Gaurav Gupta and cricketer Irfan Pathan, along with Manushi.
Manushi won Miss World 2017 crown last year, after Priyanka Chopra won it in 2000.
The event was hosted by filmmaker Karan Johar and actor Ayushmann Khurrana.
Actor Madhuri Dixit Nene performed a dance number during the India round, with her co-dancers presenting various forms of Indian classical dance. She also hummed a few lines from her latest Marathi release “Bucket List” during an interaction with the hosts.
After a long time, Kareena Kapoor Khan returned to the stage with a performance on “Tareefa” from her latest film “Veere Di Wedding”.
All the selected participants were groomed by Neha Dhupia, Rakul Preet Singh, Pooja Chopra and Pooja Hegde.
The organising team of the beauty pageant toured 30 states (including Delhi) of the country and crowned one representative from each state to participate in the final pageant.
(With agency inputs)