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Rachel Gupta, former Miss Grand International, has revealed her reasons for giving up her crown.
In a 56-minute tell-all the first Miss Grand International from India turned emotional as she recounted "what I've been going through for the last seven months."
“A lot of you knew something wasn’t right. I read all the comments. I know a lot of you could tell my reign wasn't going very, very well. There were issues with the organization on their end,” Rachel said.
“I just want to be completely transparent for all of you,” she added. “You deserve to know the truth.”
According to Rachel, she was giving a tell-all so girls aspiring to be like her would "understand what they're signing up for."
"These have been the worst few months of my life. I have been at rock bottom," she said, adding the last time she was truly happy was when she won.
"Since then, it's been going downhill.”
“It's taken a lot of courage to give up the crown that I worked so hard for and also to talk about it so openly.”
Rachel said she has put so much effort and hard work into her dream of winning the Miss Grand International crown. But “all I've gotten in return is constant harassment, mental torture, mistreatment, and it's on a systemic level. I don't think they can ever change this.”
Rachel then alleged that countries paid for votes “in the form of donations.”
“When I found out, we couldn't afford to pay for the votes,” she said. “It was so, so difficult to compete in terms of votes.”
Rachel said she did not pay for the votes because she did not have the funds, and she did not blame them or their countries who did so because “everybody wants to win.” According to Rachel, the only reason she won is because of public support.
According to Rachel, "it is impossible to work with the Miss Grand International organization" because of they way they treat people. "They only care about money. That is their only thing,” she said.
Rachel said that she has been in Thailand for many months with the organization not providing her with basic amenities.
“You think, after winning, you'd think oh my god, it's a dream come true, the organization is going to take care of me, but that's not true,” she said.
She narrated how, immediately after winning, she was moved into a hotel room, so small her suitcases could not open properly.
She was then moved to a "dilapidated house" an hour and a half away from the city, where the organization's office is located.
She was not provided a car, neither was she provided a mobile phone, there were no pots and pans for her to cook food. She would order food from delivery services but there have been instances when they'd cancel her order because the house was so faraway.
She said requested for even just fruits, but “they couldn’t even do that.”
“I requested multiple times, please can we make sure there's food? It's their responsibility. I'm there with them, with that organization. They should at least make sure that they're giving their queen food to eat.”
She also requested gym access but the organization did not arrange this for her, and said she had to beg for a yoga mat.
“At the same time, they were hounding me, constantly just talking about my weight and my body all the time,” she said. “I remember one time, they sent their representative to me and he comes up to me starts pinching me in different places. 'Oh you need to lose weight here, you need to lose weight here.'”
Crying, Rachel said, “Like, that, what am I supposed to say to that? It's so embarrassing and makes you feel so small and so bad. I understand, obviously I have to stay fit and stay in shape for the job but it's so difficult when you don't have access to anything and you're just locked in a house all day long. What are you supposed to do?”
According to Rachel, there would be days when nobody would message her, there were hardly any events, and she was stuck in the house.
“People are asking me, ‘why aren't you posting Rachel? Why are there no updates from you? And I would just say I'm really bad at it. But the truth is, what should I post? What should I post? Sitting here in the house, there's nobody to take pictures of me, I'm sitting here, depressed, nothing to do,” she said.
She also said that during red carpet events, she had to pretend everything is okay and that she is friends with organization representatives.
“The truth is, frankly, they don't know whether I'm alive or dead until we meet at the red carpet and smile for the cameras together. That's all they care about, getting that picture. It's such a false narrative.”
“I was working so much and there was so much toxicity and negativity in the organization. Everyday, I would get more disillusioned. It would get harder and harder for me," she said.
In her tell-all, Rachel spoke about financial constraints. She admitted that it was only after she won that she saw the financial arrangements in the contract. According to Rachel, she'd be paid a monthly stipend, with the the prize money coming after her reign. But "I was paid my monthly stipend for the first month, just for the month of November. And they didn't pay me at all after that," she said.
Embarrassed, Rachel admitted that it was her parents who helped her with her financial needs.
They had just given her dollars, when Rachel had a work trip at a province in Thailand. She left her money in her suitcase at home, and when she returned, not only did she she her things disheveled, she was also missing a thousand dollars from her possession.
She messaged a representative from the organization and after following up, they simply said "we can't prove that you have the money so there's nothing we can do."
"I spoke with Teresa [Chaivisut] about it and the moment I bring it up with her, she starts attacking me and blaming me for it."
"I understand it was my fault i didn't lock my suitcase but i never imagined something like this could happen on company property," she said. "I'm not a contestant anymore. I'm their queen. It's their job to take care of me and make sure I'm safe and my things are safe. But she fully blamed me."
Clearly distressed about the business model of the organization, Rachel also spoke about doing a TikTok Live to sell products and said she felt "guilty for misleading the fans."
"It baffles me. You have women — me as a speaker who wants to talk issues, who wants to create change in the world who has so many ideas not just business but philanthropic work and you want her to sell chili paste and chili sauce and random things on TikTok? Seriously," she asked disgruntled.
According to the Indian beauty queen, she wanted to raise awareness about social issues. "The only reason I'm doing this is to use my voice in a way that matters, not selling on TikTok but actually working with charities. They used this 'stop the war and violence' thing, but it's all fake. It's all a facade. Where is the stop the war and violence. Where is the advocacy work for that?"
She said, "I've heard Nawat [Itsaragrisil] say it's useless, people don't care about it. It's not entertaining. It doesn't make money so we're not going to do it."
"I'm sorry but that's not what pageantry is about. It's about being a global public figure who uses her voice for good. Not these cheap entertainment tactics," Rachel said.
The beauty queen resigned from her post on Wednesday. Shortly after, the organization released an official statement of their own, terminating the beauty queen’s title.
— Nika Roque/LA, GMA Integrated News
