The new Miss Singapore Universe Rachel Kum fulfils some of the cliches associated with pageant queens: She dreamt of winning the tiara from young, professes to be engaged in charity work to help the underprivileged, and her win has been tainted by a touch of scandal.

There was talk that she had been brought in by the organisers at a late stage of the competition in order to win it.

She denies the pageant was fixed in her favour and says she just happened to attend the preliminaries on a separate day, 'as I was not able to make it with the rest of the girls'.

Read the full interview in The Straits Times' Life! section on Monday.