IACA’s 28th Beauty Pageant a huge success

Pushtee Jhaveri (Left), IACA Miss Teen Georgia 2013 and Anusha Gopali, IACA Miss Georgia 2013. (Photo: Bytegraph)

On Saturday July 13th IACA held its 28th beauty
pageant in the Robert Ferst Center for the Arts on
the Georgia Tech campus. It was a sold out event, and
many had to watch standing up at the back and on the
two flanks of the auditorium.

“Angels on earth,” on a star and moon studded
stage, were thirteen teenaged girls who participated
in IACA Miss Teen Georgia pageant and fifteen young
ladies who took part in the IACA Miss Georgia pageant.
All 28 contestants performed the opening dance,
choreographed by Shiva Turlapati of Shiv’s Institute
of Dance. Archith Seshadri and Movina Nagarajan
emceed for the teens, and Sumeet Goraya and Anjali
Tripathi for the ladies.

Eight judges participated: Anupa Thakurta, an exponent
of Bharatnatyam; Hiromi Sato, assistant to the
Japanese Consul-General in Atlanta; Nancy Dozier, in
the beauty and entertainment industry; Robert Hope, a
40-year veteran of the public relations and event marketing
industry; Ross Rossin, a portrait artist; Shivani
Gandhi, 2008 winner of Miss Georgia; Sniti Mishra, a finalist
of Sa Re Ga Ma Pa singing TV show; and Surinder
Bedi, CEO of Image Boutique Shop and a designer of
bridal outfits.

Gurpreet Sarin, the jazz and soul singer who made
history on American Idol as “The Turbanator,” sang
Ray Charles melodies, including “Georgia on My
Mind.” (Photo: Bytegraph)

Special entertainment was provided by Gurpreet
Sarin, the jazz and soul singer who made history on
American Idol as “The Turbanator,” here singing Ray
Charles melodies, including “Georgia on My Mind.”
Hema Shilpa, a Kuchipudi dancer,
performed to a medley of Bollywood
songs. After intermission, Sniti Mishra
charmed the audience with classical
rendering of a dance number and the
movie song “In ankhon ki masti.”

Contestants showed their style on
stage in beautiful saris and dresses,
with makeup and jewelry making them
as gorgeous as brides. The audience
learned how to participate in voting by
SMS texting on their cellphones for the
People’s Choice Award, and how scores
would be tabulated; results were announced
at the end of the pageant.

Sniti Mishra, a finalist of Sa Re Ga Ma Pa, the TV
show, sings “In ankhon ki masti.” (Photo: Bytegraph)

A talent round for all contestants
had been held at the IACA facility in
Smyrna on July 9th, and the video of
this performance was shown to the
audience and judges. The top 3 ladies
then danced on stage: Veena Anilkumar—
who performed a classical dance
called Mohini Attam, Nancy Jhanji, and
Geetika Jape. Similarly, the top 3 teens were Bhoomi
Laliwala (piano), Aneesha Dasari (singing), and Pushtee
Jhaveri (dancing), who all performed amid much support
from the audience.

The evening gown walk was followed by question-answer
for each of the 28 contestants. Ten finalists
took a second round of questions, with each finalist
given the choice of a judge to ask the
question. Finalists were Nancy Jhanji,
Anusha Gopali, Neha Sinha, Geetika
Jape, and Veena Anilkumar, and teens
Arsheen Kour, Pushtee Jhaveri, Gargee
Sathe, Sushma Neelagaru, and Neha
Gulrajani.

Students of Shiv’s Institute of Dance
(below) danced in Bollywood style, and emcee
Sumeet Goraya had time to ask a few
questions of his own to contestants.

Finally came the results:
•Anusha
Gopali was crowned IACA Miss Georgia 2013 and
•Pushtee Jhaveri, IACA Miss Teen Georgia 2013.
•Veena Anilkumar won the runner-up’s crown and
•Gargee Sathe teen runner-up.
•People’s Choice: Pooja Mayur.
•Best Talent: Nancy Jhanji & Bhoomi Laliwala.
•Miss Congeniality: Geetika Jape.
•Best Eyes: Rishika Laliwala.
•Best Smile: Anusha Gopali.

Pageant winners (outside) and runners-up (inside) stand
with Paddy Sharma (left) and Kaushal Tripathi, IACA President (center). (Photo: Bytegraph)

Dr. Paddy Sharma, IACA chairperson,
along with Dr. Lakshmi Rao, gave
each contestant a trophy and bag of goodies.

Mr. Kaushal Tripathi, president of IACA, and Rina
Gupta, director of the pageant, applauded the community,
contestants, and all participants, especially the
parents for trusting IACA with their most precious possession,
their daughters—”Angels on earth.” Mr. Tripathi
assured all of IACA’s commitment to stay worthy
of the trust and work to make the pageant even stronger.
He spoke of the contestants’ hard work during the
last two months on poise, self-confidence, and friendship.
He noted that Virag Tripathi, music coordinator
and DJ of the evening, had initiated the connection to
StandUp2Cancer and that the pageant raised funds for
the organization, in line with IACA’s objective of giving
back to the community.

Website Bonus Feature
Photo Gallery: by Bytegraph