Miss World America this month held its virtual competition for 2020, with a quartet of Indian Americans making the Top 10 and one, Manya Saaraswat, making it all the way to the Top 5.

Alissa Anderegg of New York was the grand prize winner and will hold the title of 2020 Miss World America.

In addition to Saaraswat of Pennsylvania, Indian Americans Serene Singh of Colorado; Manju Bangalore of Oregon; and Shree Saini of Washington were top 10 finishers.

The Top 10 were named from a group of 28 women that included six Indian Americans and a Bangladeshi American (see India-West article here: https://bit.ly/2H5dFFD).

Saaraswat immigrated to the United States when she was three years old. She has since moved around seven times and has attended over 10 different schools, according to her bio.

Because she was moving around a lot, her family became her best friends and remain so today. Both of her parents are physicians and from a young age, Saaraswat was encouraged to lead a service driven life. At 14, she began volunteering in the neonatal intensive care unit at a local hospital. It was here where she found her love for pediatrics and medicine, her bio said.

She entered Bucknell University on a presidential fellowship, which is the highest merit scholarship the university offers. Her academic endeavors led her to a stem cell internship at Harvard University, four publications in medical journals, and a life-changing trip to volunteer and intern at a local hospital in India, the bio notes.

Currently, she is pursuing a master of science of health policy and economics at Weill Cornell Medicine before she enters medical school.

Singh is a native Coloradan and a Rhodes Scholar, and is starting her doctorate degree in criminal justice at the University of Oxford, her bio notes.

A Truman Scholar and an alumnus of the University of Colorado, she graduated with summa cum laude honors in political science and journalism degrees with a minor in leadership studies, it said.

Singh, her bio notes, cares deeply about empowering girls and women worldwide. She is the founder of a The Serenity Project Brave Enough to Fly nonprofit, an organization that aims to give confidence tools to at-risk women. Her passion for paying forward her skills from pageantry and modeling have reached hundreds of women, has won Victoria Secrets GRL PWR campaign, and serve as a Dalai Lama Fellow and Global Changemaker, her bio adds.

Singh plans to advance her passion for public service to one day serve on the United States Supreme Court.

Bangalore is a physicist, actor and the founder of Operation Period, a youth-led nonprofit addressing menstrual inequity through art, advocacy, education, community engagement and aid.

She received her physics degree and math minor from the University of Oregon in 2018 and is now pursuing her M.S. in aerospace engineering with a concentration on propulsion systems, it said.

She has worked at two NASA centers, Marshall Space Flight Center and Johnson Space Center, on propulsion and the cockpit displays for the Orion spacecraft, as well as in the White House under President Obama on science policy.

Saini isa global speaker who has been invited to speak in over eight countries and 30 states, her bio touts.

She graduated from the University of Washington and has been a visiting student at Harvard, Stanford and Yale universities.

Saini has devoted her life to community service. At age 15, she started her nonprofit and since then, she has written thousands of articles and served hundreds of nonprofits, it said.

Herimpact has reached millions: earning her the Best Pageant Titleholder award and recognitions from the Secretary of State, Senate, Governor and American Heart Association CEO.

Sainis childhood dream to serve as Miss World inspired her to change her adversities to advocacy. She is a survivor of bullying, facial burns and heart defect.

At just age 12, she got a pacemaker surgery to keep her alive. Doctors said her physical activities would be forever limited but Saini persevered to regain her lost physical and emotional strength, the bio said.

In addition to Saaraswat and Anderegg, the top 5 included Alissa Musto of Massachusetts; Molly May of Mississippi; and Megan Gordan of South Carolina.

The Miss World America 2020 winner will be formally announced as the winner at a crowning ceremony is slated for Oct. 24.

Last years winner Emmy Rose Cuvelier will crown her successor who will represent the United States at the 70th Miss World edition to be held in the last quarter of next year.

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Manya Saaraswat Makes Top 5 Finish in 2020 Miss World America Competition, Three Other Indian Americans in Top 10 - India West