Irene Skliva of Greece was crowned Miss World Saturday at the end of a heavily guarded beauty contest overshadowed by protests and threats by militant women to commit suicide by immolation.
The 18-year-old professional model won the title after police had detained more than 1,500 protesters in the southern Indian city of Bangalore.Scattered clashes throughout the city, dubbed India's "Silicon Valley" because of its concentration of high-technology industries, left at least seven policemen injured and clouds of tear gas before the pageant started.
But inside a fortress-like cricket stadium, the three-hour spectacle passed off without incident, to traditional Indian music and dance.
Hazel-eyed Skliva of Greece was crowned by the outgoing Miss World, Jacqueline Aguilera of Venezuela.
Carolina Arango, 19, of Colombia, was named first runner-up, and Anuska Prado, 20, of Brazil, the second runner-up.
The contest was held amid unprecedented security to guard against attacks by protesters, who claimed the event demeaned women and degraded India's 5,000-year-old cultural heritage.
Organizers said the event was watched by more than two billion television viewers worldwide - an audience they said had attracted publicity-seeking protesters.
Some 10,000 police and paramilitary troopers were deployed in Bangalore's streets.
Several thousand threw a security blanket around the stadium, which a group of women militants had vowed to penetrate and then to swallow cyanide and set themselves on fire.
Police with blankets, water hoses and sniffer dogs were among the spectators inside the stadium.
Kinay Narayana Shashikala, leader of Mahila Jagran Samiti (Forum for Awakening Women) which had promised the immolation protest, remained at large, police said.
The Miss World pageant had been dogged for more than two months by demonstrations.
Last week, an unemployed man in southern India died after setting himself ablaze in protest.
Hours before the start of the contest, three separate demonstrations led by right-wing Hindu nationalists left clouds of tear gas over roads leading to the outdoor stadium.
Police said three members of parliament from New Delhi belonging to the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were among those held in the protests, which had heavy political overtones.
The contest was held in the capital of Karnataka, the home state of Indian Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda, whose 13-group center-left coalition succeeded the BJP in June.
The right-wing BJP held office for only 12 days after general elections in April and May.
The beauty contest itself tried to be a tribute to Indian culture, set against the backdrop of reconstructed ruins of a 14th-century Hindu temple.
In deference to Indian mores, the contestants wore long transparent skirts around their swimsuits.
Police said the protesters who were detained would probably be freed Sunday after the Miss World contestants left for New Delhi, India's capital.