Newly crowned Mrs South Africa, Verushka Singh, discusses all things motherhood, what her crown means to her, her journey during the competition and her future aspirations.
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Verushka Singh, from Steyn City in Johannesburg, was crowned Mrs South Africa last Friday, making history as the first Indian South African to win the title.
In a conversation with “Independent Media Lifestyle”, the 39-year-old, who dedicated almost 14 years of her life to working in corporate, revealed that entering this competition was more than just for the glitz and glamour, but rather a lifelong dream.
“So I never expected or planned on winning, I was at a stage in my life where I felt I needed something a bit more. I wanted a bit of confirmation.
“I wanted to level up. You know, I was very safe in my career and my job. I was giving a lot to my team that I was leading there, to my son, and to my family. I almost didn't feel like, you know, that spark or joy in me at that time.
"I was kind of going through the motions of life. And I saw this, and as a little girl, I always loved pageantry. There's something about it. I think that we all love it. Very glamorous and exciting.
"I thought, ‘You know, why not?’ But I never thought, ‘okay, I could do it.’ I just thought, let me go and learn from these amazing women, see what I can learn and just like do something for myself and pick myself up a bit. That's actually, you know, what I entered for,” she said.
Singh’s reply was unexpected. Typically, when you ask someone who has won something big, you would expect something along the lines of “happy, excited or over the moon.”
Mrs South Africa 2025, Verushka Singh.
Image: Supplied
But for the beauty queen, she simply said she felt privileged to win the crown. This truly speaks volumes about her character and how much this title means to her.
When asked how she hopes her win inspires other women in our country, she shared: “I hope that they can see what I've done and just basically give more hope to themselves and learn to love themselves.
“Because I think my story from where I came from and how I felt, people can maybe relate to. You know, I mean, I was in a corporate environment that was very behind the scenes in the sense that it wasn't glamorous.
“I was very hard working, and I think that a lot of South African women, regardless of background or race, are all like that, extremely hard working. We give so much to everyone else in our nature, you know, especially married women and things. But I've just learned to give to myself.”
Throughout the beauty pageants, all we see as viewers is glitz and glamour, but there are challenges that contestants go through that we do not get to see. For Singh, she shared the two most challenging things she had to go through during the competition.
“For me, there were two aspects that I found challenging.
“The first one was just becoming a lot more visible because, as I was saying, I was very comfortable, almost 14 years, very comfortable in my technical space in a corporate, doing that type of work. I was not the type of person who was out there, very reserved or quiet.
“The second one was practically, like balancing being a mom and your career and everything else, can be challenging.
“But then, in going through that, and going through the journey, I also realised that women are capable of so much.”
With every challenge came memories that she loved and embraced, and for her, it was the sisterhood that she experienced and the friendships that were formed.
“The biggest thing was truly the sisterhood. Absolutely, the sisterhood. As opposed to even coming from an engineering background, I'm not that surrounded by females that much, you know, it's like an all-male-dominated kind of environment.
“So I loved it. It didn't feel like a competition. It was like I could open up to these women.
Verushka Singh and the Mrs South Africa contestants, whom she refers to as her sisters.
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I could trust them. I told them things that affected me, and we were so open and vulnerable with each other. I felt so comfortable in that space.”
After all the glitz and glamour, a beauty queen needs to recharge, and Singh’s way of recharging is connecting with the earth.
She loves taking walks with her son, meditating and spending time in nature.
Singh also highlighted that motherhood and her son contributed the most her personal growth.
“Motherhood has been my greatest feature of all. My son has really taught me to absolutely be present. If I'm not present, he really picks it up, and he's not happy. So it is just, I have to, from the time he was young, from the time he was born, I have to be present.”
When asked how she plans on using her title as Mrs South Africa to raise awareness about climate change and sustainable living, she revealed: “So the one aspect that I'd like to look at is awareness.
“It's no one's fault, but sometimes we must understand, and we think that sustainability is an issue for privileged people, not understanding that the impacts are going to affect everyone.
“So what I'd like to do is bring more awareness to the fact of what it actually is and how we all can play a role in that. In doing that, I'd like to speak more about schools, workshops and women.
“I'd like to go to schools to speak to them more about the issue and get people more aware and conscious about it. The other thing is, I'd like to tap into is corporate as well and see what they can do from their perspective.”
Singh also shared how she is planning on using her advocacy to combat social and environmental issues that South Africa faces, with her focus being mostly on ESG.
“I think the thing about sustainability is it's very much linked. One of the key aspects I look at the ESG, but ESG is all your environmental factors which directly impact the community and community resilience.
“The second letter in ESG stands for social. So it's all social impacts. So everything that happens immediately impacts communities. If things happen, communities have to move around.
“So what I think is it's deeply social, it's deeply human. It's just finding the linkages and how we can think and sort of help certain links that we can to uplift those communities.”
The beauty queen also said that since she will be representing SA at the international Mrs World in 2027, she aims to make the world see the beauty of our country and represent it positively.
“I think what I'd like to prepare is to take as many positive aspects of our country with us. So as I'm going through this journey, I’m learning, speaking to people and connecting with as many people as possible.
“I feel like that's what I want to take to Mrs World because often we are not seen for that amazing, positive, impactful, resilient country that we are. And we need to change that.
Verushka Singh shared that when she goes to represent SA globally at Mrs World in 2027, she wants to highlight and show the positivity of our country.
Image: Supplied
“I really want to go in the end to show this is who we are and kind of represent as much of the positivity in this country as I possibly can. The positivity, the beauty, the impact, like the nature of people, that's what I want to bring to it.”
She also shared a word of advice for women: “I think that I would say to women that I wish women could love their own selves and see the beauty in themselves. Through that, they can spread joy, they can spread inspiration to others.
“I just think once you realise your own light and your own beauty, then you can share it with the resources of the world.”