Miss Universe asked to pay Rs 4 Lakh duty fee at airport for pageant crown

MUMBAI: Miss Universe 2017 Demi-Leigh Nel-Peters while arriving at Mumbai international airport was taken by surprise as airport customs asked her to pay Rs 4 lakhs Indian rupees in customs duty for a mere replica of her original crown.

The South African beauty pageant winner arrived in India to judge a beauty contest.

Though she arrived at Mumbai Airport at 7 pm in the evening she was not allowed to leave till 1 am in the morning!

Miss Universe Demi-Leigh had been crowned Miss Universe in 2017 though while traveling she did not bring the original Rs 1.77 crore crown to Mumbai but had brought a replica instead.

Immigration officers asked about the value of the replica, and arrived at an estimate of Rs 11 lakh.

After some confusion about whether duty ought to be charged on the crown, the customs officers concluded that beauty pageants are not exempted from the fee. After a hue and cry for six hours, Demi-Leigh paid R4 lakh and was then allowed to leave.

Her team informed that the organisers had already made it known to Customs about the crown and had completed all the paper work.

Her publicist shared, “Her flight was delayed, and by the time it landed, a new shift had begun at the customs. The officers in the earlier shift, who had been informed about her arrival and the needed clearance, had not done a proper handover of the paperwork. So she had to wait till it was done again.”