Our very own Telugu girl, Manasa Jonnalagadda has made us proud by winning the coveted Ms India Asia Pacific 2017 title. This pageant was conducted on the 14th of August at Thailand. A total of 15 countries participated in this prestigious pageant and out of 15 contestants, Manasa represented Hyderabad and won the crown.
She was born in Hyderabad and later moved to USA when she was one year old. She was raised there for 16 years and came back and joined the Meridian school, Madhapur. She was even crowned as Ms Meridian during her school days. Manasa is currently doing her 3rd year engineering in ECE at Gitam University. This is the first time she has participated in a beauty pageant at international level. Her parents are very supportive about her passion and have been with her through out this journey.
The 2 months preparation before the pageant included a lot of hard work and dedication. She worked on her diet, fitness, learnt about professional speeches, communication skills, personality development, yoga, how you present yourself and body language as well. And the effort payed off in the form of the Miss India Asia Pacific title. She says she is passionate about acting but wants to do roles that involve less of skin show and more of acting. She believes that ‘a girl should carry confidence in whatever she does’. She herself had a lot of insecurities about her body because she faced a lot of body shaming issues. She feels that every girl should embrace her body regardless of what she looks like. She aims to change the way the society thinks about women. Heroines in the movie industry are targeted if they do not dress up or put on make up but we need to understand that everyone has their bad days and most importantly looks don’t define a girl. A lot of talented girls are not coming out in the open because they lack opportunities or they are scared of how the society will perceive them. But she encourages the girls to face their fears and express themselves nevertheless of what the society thinks because they know who they are. Taking cue from her inspiring message, let us hope she achieves more and has a great path ahead. \
