Miss World 1997
- an amalgam
of news reports -
A
24-year-old celebrity manager from India was crowned Miss World, defeating
85 competitors at the pageant on the Seychelles Islands.
Diane Hayden, a 5-foot-8 brunette, told reporters that the victory “means
the world to me.”
Miss New Zealand, 18-year-old Laura Lee Martinovich, was second and Miss
South Africa, law and psychology student Jessica Moguang, 24, finished
third.
Contestants from 86 countries and territories were judged by a nine-member
panel that included former Seychelles
President James Mancham and American actor Lou Gossett Jr.
Hayden, holder of the Miss India title, is required to make 50 appearances
to promote the Seychelles, a group of islands with 75,000 people in the
middle of the Indian Ocean.
Hayden, who runs her own celebrity management company in Bombay and hopes to
launch a record label, said she would use part of her $95,000 prize money to
help her family.
The winner said she also will postpone her upcoming wedding to fulfill her
duties as Miss World.
President France Albert Rene, who has ruled the country since he overthrew
Mancham in a 1977 coup, watched the pageant from a front-row seat.
