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I've never understood beauty pageants. Yes, I know there are as many arguments for as there are against these glittery, chittery tamashas, both sides claiming they are speaking in the interests of womankind as a whole. On the whole, I've tended to regard them as rather harmless, gormless, aesthetically pleasing exercises in corporate promotion, but I wouldn't care to overly judge any such event � either from the picket lines or from the judges' panel.
I can understand, however, that a Miss Nepal event represents an opportunity for participants to develop character, empower themselves, or simply make a pile of cash. Ditto for the promoters. If the winner then goes on in the time-honoured tradition to promote certain worthy causes, good for them (and hopefully for us).
What I can't understand is the proliferation of ethnic beauty pageants. Miss Newa, Miss Sherpa, Miss Limbu, the list goes on. Ok, these too represent an opportunity for participants beyond that offered by Miss Nepal, ostensibly because they also represent historically disadvantaged ethnic communities. But I'm yet to hear of a Miss Chamar or Miss Chepang. There must be such a thing as being too disadvantaged to attract corporate backing. And the hypocrisy of the Maoist-affiliated groups who once shut down Miss Nepal for 'denigrating' women, but now allow a dime-a-dozen Miss fill-in-the-ethnic-blank-unless-you-are-Bahun-or-Chettri pageants in the name of ethnic expression is, well, typical.
But what really gets my goat is the latest edition � Miss Mangol. Who are the Mangols? Are they everyone in the country except for Bahuns and Chettris? Is Miss Mangol a forum for indigenous women to express themselves � as opposed to Bahun and Chettri women, probable migrants from India, who may have their own trouble expressing themselves? If Miss Mangol is a front for 'real' Nepali women, then why does the idiotic term 'Mangol' claim roots thousands of kilometres away, on the other side of the Great Wall of China?
I will be accused of resenting janjatis for their fun in the sun (being a non-janjati automatically disqualified from commenting on janjatis, just as the application forms for Miss Mangol imply Bahuns and Chettris, and those lacking 'good moral character', are disqualified from competing). So I had better make it clear I have nothing against any ethnic community in this riotous Nepali garden of ours. What I do resent is attempts � calculated or not � to simplistically pit those Nepalis of Mongoloid ethnic origin against those of Indo-Aryan origin, and justify and augment the division by implying the former lack the privileges of the latter, wholesale, period. It's one thing to be proud of your ethnicity and culture � Newar, Chettri or Limbu � it's quite another to create false Great Walls of China in our own backyard.
If, as this year's winner Barsha Rani Gurung declared, it is crucial to make youth culturally aware, and, as organisers Action Entertainment claim, "Unity in differences and equality in multiplicities are our common characteristics", then why is it necessary to exclude Bahuns and Chettris, that is, to manufacture an event of their own? Perhaps no one really sees the irony in the dash for filthy lucre. It's no surprise that Miss Mangolian Kid was sponsored by the Chaudhary Group. Being plain Nepali has never been more difficult.
