On The Cover: Shree Saini

Shree Saini was the object of bullying throughout her teenage years. It was mental agony for her, but the young girl didn’t let the harsh words and actions of others define her. Shree endured it all, believing in herself and positivity. In the end, it led to her being chosen Miss India Worldwide in 2018.

The Saini family moved to the United States from India’s Punjab region when Shree was only three years old. They lived on both coasts and many places in between before settling down in the city of Moses Lake, Washington. Shree spent her school years there, being bullied from middle school onwards. She was different in appearance and her school mates excluded her both in words and actions.

Being made an outcast is hard, especially in the teenage years when belonging is what most young people look for. Shree could have become bitter, but instead, she chose to be better. She didn’t reduce herself to the aggressive mentality of the bullies but rather, rose above it all and grew stronger from the adversity. At home, her parents had taught her to practice “charity of spirit,” to highlight the good in others.

With a mindset of doing good, Shree began submitting inspirational messages to the local newspaper, the Columbia Basin Herald, becoming an advocate for others who were suffering from the meanness of peers.

One of Shree’s happy outlets had always been ballet. She started studying it at a young age, but nobody knew at the time that she would have an extra obstacle to clear: a heart condition. Her heart had been defective since birth, an ailment that had somehow escaped every doctor’s examination.

At twelve years old, she had an operation to receive a pacemaker.

“Before the surgery, her heart was doing less than 20 beats a minute (instead of the normal 60.)” her mother, Ekta Saini, said. “After the surgery, she had to have her arm tied to her chest during recovery, which led to other problems.”

Having a pacemaker led to more bullying at school, but problems and adversaries didn’t slow her down one bit. She excelled in ballet.

Bullying and the heart condition were not all Shree was going to have to conquer. There was more trouble to come.

The family had moved to George, Washington by the time Shree was in high-school. Ekta Saini recalls one frightening night when Shree could have been killed on her way back from a school function. “It was December and dark. Shree drove across some black ice and her car flipped over.”

The accident took place only a mile and a half from the family’s home. Despite the horrific burn injuries to her face from the accident, Shree walked home.
A year later, Shree entered a beauty pageant, and continued to do so in the consecutive years. She won many titles, the most recent of which is Miss India Worldwide.

Along the way, Shree has had many mentors, the most prevalent of them being her mother who instilled in her daughter the appreciation of an education and of other people.

On June 15, 2019, Shree graduated from the University of Washington with Bachelor’s degrees in Journalism and Business.

“She is going to take a year off to do inspirational speaking engagements,” Ekta Saini explained. “Shree would like to have her own talk-show, like Oprah Winfrey.”

Shree’s strong will and positivity had always been obvious to her parents, but even so, there was a surprise left in her on her nineteenth birthday. She wanted to go to Calcutta, India, not Seattle for a rock-concert or a shopping spree, but to India to visit the Mother Theresa Ministries. Her parents agreed to the journey and later said it had matured their daughter.

Shree may look up to Oprah Winfrey as a talk-show hostess, but she finds something even more profound in Mother Theresa’s work, a kind ambition to help.

This past year has been demanding for Shree, having juggled her studies and the Miss India Worldwide engagements simultaneously. She has visited four countries, eleven states and seventy cities in less than a year. Shree submitted many of her academic papers from the airport, just minutes before the gates to her flight closed.

Shree has used her time in the limelight not to endorse herself, but to be a spokeswoman for those suffering from bullying and to speak against human trafficking.

According to Ekta Saini, her daughter was always a loving child, easily giving hugs to anyone. It seems Shree hasn’t changed all that much as she continues to embrace the world with kindness.

For more information and inspiration, go to www.shreesaini.com.

This article originally appeared in the Autumn 2019 issue of CHOICES Magazine