NEW YORK, Dec 19: A Pakistani girl, crowned Miss Pakistan at a beauty contest in Mississauga, Canada, was profiled in the New York Times on Friday.

Ms Natasha Paracha, 24, lives in East Village, New York and works at the United Nations. She has been living in the United States since age 2.

The founder of the pageant, a Toronto entrepreneur named Sonia Ahmed, told the newspaper she had been making plans to take the pageant to Pakistan until the fall of President Pervez Musharraf whose government was considered relatively open to the advancement of women — which in Pakistan, at least, meant the conditions were relatively favourable for aspiring beauty queens. Now, she is keeping the pageant in Canada because she cannot guarantee the security of contestants.

“It may only be like 1 per cent of the total population, but the fundamentalist problem is still present in Pakistan,” Ms Ahmed said.

Since she was crowned in May, Ms Paracha, a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, has limited her appearances to the United States; speaking at a gathering of non-resident Pakistanis in New York, showing up at a Pakistan Day celebration in Washington, raising money for the Vision of Development, a non-profit agency that she started in high school to support rural Pakistani women, and making occasional media appearance.

This month, she went on CNN to urge her country to stand up and condemn the terrorist attacks on Mumbai. According to Times, Ms Paracha accidentally used the word “condone” instead of “condemn”.

The Miss Pakistan pageant, now in its sixth year, is unique as these things go. None of this year’s 12 contestants reside in Pakistan, but hail from the United States, Canada and England.