Women from 40 countries, including Australia, Bahrain, Denmark, France, Indonesia, USA and UK will be heading to the Emirates to compete for the title of Miss India Worldwide 2014 this weekend.
Four participants from the Middle East are part of the competition this year. Miss India UAE Sanna Monga, Miss India Kuwait Rachel Bianca, Miss India Oman Niharika Pathak and Miss India Qatar Trisha Verma were selected for the pageant that will be held at the Al Raha Beach Hotel Abu Dhabi on Friday. The show will be broadcast on the television channels MTV India and Colors – Mena region.
The winner will receive cash prizes and trips to five countries around the world. Participants will contest in categories such as Colors Viewer’s Choice, Miss Bollywood Diva, Miss Congeniality, Miss Photogenic and Miss Talented.
The UK-based Nehal Bhogaita won last year and became the first hearing-impaired Miss India Worldwide. Bhogaita went on to work with special needs communities around the world.
• Tickets for the pageant are priced from Dh150 and can be booked on platinumlist.net. For more information, call 04 339 3179.
aahmed@thenational.ae
Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
ENGLAND TEAM
England (15-1)
George Furbank; Jonny May, Manu Tuilagi, Owen Farrell (capt), Elliot Daly; George Ford, Ben Youngs; Tom Curry, Sam Underhill, Courtney Lawes; Charlie Ewels, Maro Itoje; Kyle Sinckler, Jamie George, Joe Marler
Replacements: Luke Cowan-Dickie, Ellis Genge, Will Stuart, George Kruis, Lewis Ludlam, Willi Heinz, Ollie Devoto, Jonathan Joseph
