In the light of a controversy over the alleged claim that she was Miss India Australia, the host of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Sydney show has clarified she never claimed to the title-holder for grabbing the event's anchoring.
The Indian Australian Community Foundation (IACF) organised the community reception programme for Modi Nov 17 at Sydney's AllPhones Arena, where over 16,000 people congregated for his public address, held mainly for the Indian diaspora.
The event had Rashi Kapoor and Siddharth Trivedi as its masters of ceremony (MCs).
Stating that she was actually a "Miss India Global 2013", Rashi Kapoor told IANS that the controversy was caused by incorrect reporting about her introduction as Miss India Australia.
"Personally, I never quoted my title wrong. Certain sections of the media may have got my title wrong when the news came out later. Some sections of media did get my title correct as well."
Rashi said she was "too busy preparing for one of the biggest performances in my life" to respond to such allegations. "As soon as the event was over, I did issue a clarification on my Facebook page which described my correct title."
According to the Herald Sun newspaper, the title is actually held by Phalguni Kataria who is devastated at missing out on the opportunity to host the event and "utterly shocked someone else is claiming to be Miss India Australia".
"I had thought that it would be me who would be asked to host the Prime Minister, like Miss India USA had done in America," the report quoted Phalguni as saying.
The IACF, meanwhile, told IANS over phone that the anchors were selected following an audition process approved by its executive committee and being a beauty pageant contestant was never a consideration for a selection.
"The committee members of IACF had chosen Rashi and Siddharth after a series of auditions. There was never any consideration that some beauty pageant winner would host the event," IACF's spokesperson Balesh Dhankhar said.
Leading up to the event, one of our hosts, Rashi, was interviewed by various media outlets. Some of those media outlets seem to have misquoted her title while reporting, he said.
"We clarify that Rashi was chosen based on her performance during the auditions and any title held by her did not have any role in her selection. Neither did she make any claim to us of holding any title for securing this role."
(Sandeep Datta can be contacted at sandeep.d@ians.in)
