Bhasha Mukherjee, the current holder of the Miss England title has set aside her crown so she can return to her job as a doctor during the coronavirus crisis.
The 24-year-old had taken a career break as a junior doctor after competing in the Miss World pageant in December 2019.
She returned to the UK from charity work in India to rejoin her colleagues at Pilgrim Hospital in Boston, Lincolnshire
Bhasha Mukherjee told CNN that while the work she was doing in India was important, she felt her time and skills would be of greater use to the NHS during the coronavirus epidemic.
According to Mukherjee, it didn’t feel right for her to continue wearing her Miss England crown. Even if she was performing humanitarian work while her colleagues were risking their lives treating coronavirus patients back home.
Miss England defends her decision
“When you are doing all this humanitarian work abroad, you’re still expected to put the crown on, get ready … look pretty. I wanted to come back home. I wanted to come and go straight to work.”
She continued: “I felt that my services, given the training that I’ve had – I’m a trained doctor – my services would be much more useful in a hospital,” she said.
“I’m not belittling the work, the charity work that I was doing, but in a way, you know. This is what I’ve been trained to do, so I wanted to come back and do that.
“Initially when we were doing all this good work and the happy smiles; we went to so many homes for orphanages and little girls who’d been abandoned and things like that… but towards the end of the trip… I did not feel like wearing my crown. I did not feel like attending the events.”
Now in isolation in Derby, Mukherjee said she was waiting to hear when she can get up-to-date training, so she can help fellow medical professionals during the pandemic.
“The ward that I work in is the respiratory ward, but from what I’m hearing from my colleagues; the doctors are being sort of filtered and sent wherever they’re needed,” she said.
