Celina Jaitley was fourth runner up in the Miss Universe beauty pageant of year 2001, held in Puerto Rico. Celina Jaitley is daughter of a Punjabi father who was an Indian Army officer. Her mother is an Afghan and is a child psychologist by profession. She was born in 1981, and stands 5”6’ in socks. Her nickname is Chinky. Her schooling was done all over the country due to the frequent transfers of her father. She had to change thirteen schools till her Board exams. Presently her family stays in Bangalore. Celina’s past five generations have served the army and there was a point of time in her life, when she was also tinkering with the idea of taking the Combined Defence Services exam.
She graduated in Commerce and fetched her a marketing job for a Cell phone company in Kolkatta. There she participated in a local beauty contest just for the heck of participation and to everybody’s surprise she emerged victorious. This gave her a boost and she sent her pictures for the Miss India contest. Just a day before the preliminary rounds were to begin Celina got the invitation to participate. Soon she walked away with the coveted, Miss India crown bagging almost every title from Best Skin to Best Clothes to MTVs most wanted.
This title win enabled her to participate in the Miss universe title. But Indian girls had won it for three consecutive years. There was an immense pressure on her persona with press flooding her with questions about rigging. She was weighed down by this pre –contest scepticism and it did cast its impact on the final outcome. Celina was adjudged fourth runner up from amongst 83 contestants.
