Former Miss Barbados Claims Miss World 2000 Was Rigged to Make Priyanka Chopra Win

A surprising allegation is doing the rounds on the internet that the Miss World 2000 contestant from India, Priyanka Chopra, won the coveted crown because of favoritism.

The news came up after last month’s controversy in the beauty pageant world. It was alleged by several Miss USA contestants that this year’s competition and the consequent result was rigged to crown Miss Texas, R’Bonney Gabriel.

R’Bonney Gabriel

When she was crowned, instead of her fellow participants rushing to congratulate her as they usually would, walked off the stage instead.

Miss Missouri, Mikala McGhee, told Insider that an investigation to reach the bottom of the matter is underway.

She said, “A lot of the girls felt like it was the organization’s plan from the beginning for R’Bonney to win, no matter who else was competing”.

Leliani McConney

After this incident, former Miss Barbados, Leilani McConney, posted a video on YouTube in which she said that the same happened in 2000 when Indian contestant Priyanka Chopra won the Miss World crown.

She said, “I literally went through the same thing at Miss World. I was Miss Barbados. The year I went, Miss India won. Mind you, Miss India had won the previous year (Yukta Mookhey), and the sponsor was also ZeeTV, an Indian cable station. Our sashes had ZeeTV on top and then the names of our countries. This is very familiar to me”.

Here is the video:

The video was also shared on Reddit and Indians defended Priyanka Chopra’s win and criticized McConney for crying over sour grapes. They added that Priyanka Chopra rightfully won it and her current success is a testimony saying that look how successful she is now because she deserved it.

In 2017, Chopra spoke about her 2000 win in an interview with Elle.

“I do think pageants are subject to a lot of stereotyping, and some of them deserve it too, but my experience with Miss World wasn’t like that,” she told the outlet.

“It was focused on being a woman of substance – how well you’d be able to solve world issues, what kind of orator you are etc,” McConney added.

On the work front, Priyanka Chopra will be seen in Citadel, which involves the directors of Avengers: Endgame.

Citadel is set to be the second most expensive show ever produced, after The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.

Produced by the Russo Brothers and Patrick Moran, the Amazon series has reportedly overrun its already massive budget and may finally cost much above $200 million.