Beware of fraudulent beauty pageants

Beauty pageants may lure your mind if you want a career as a model but beware of fraudulent organisers who may dupe the aspirants. Watch out for its affiliations, social media presence and do thorough referral checks, suggest experts.

Natasha Grover, Brand and Operations Head, Miss India Organisation says the following should be kept in mind before participating in a beauty contest:

The parent company and the brand name
Real - online and offline testimonials
Referral checks from the previous winners
Life after the win
Sponsors on board to gauge legitimacy
Background checks
Media plan

Shelly Maheshwari Gupta, Founder and Conceptualiser, Empress Universe 2018, suggests:

Legal: A registered company name. Fake beauty pageants rarely have a legally registered name. Check if the company is registered under the name displayed.

Registered brand/title name and logos: A good, committed and strong beauty pageant would not only be registered, it would have further legal validations like registered trademarks of their brand/title name and logos. So, you need to check for both. The title name and the Logo both must be registered or atleast one.

Check affiliations: Check for the affiliations from reputed organisations. If a beauty pageant has affiliations or association with known players, it is most likely authentic.

Visit office: If possible, make a visit to the registered office address as mentioned on website or you can get it through some research. Ask for an appointment. You also have the right to ask the pageant authority to produce the registration and other statuary documents. Judge yourself seeing the staff working in office and the work place.

Associations: One of the most definite signs of authenticity for a beauty pageant is to have associations with reputed, well known brands and personalities. Start with checking the name of the brand ambassador, brands it is associated with, sponsors.

Additional charges: Is there a beauty pageant constantly asking you for paying additional charges? A good sign of an authentic beauty pageant is to have no hidden charges. Apart from the application fees, most fake beauty pageants would keep asking you to pay more by asking for additional charges like grooming fee, consultation fee, make-up charges, training charges, and more. A good beauty pageant would have a transparent payment process and you would not be asked for sudden and unexpected payments.

Check website and landline numbers: Check the company's legitimate land line phone numbers and address. Do make a call. The address mentioned on the website should be the same as the address the company is registered with. A fake organisation would have vague details about these things. Always look for website's policy page and terms and conditions.

Social media and online presence: Social media is a very important aspect for any beauty pageant. Check the social media pages and see what people are saying about the pageant."