Our Bureau
New Jersey, NJ
UmaSofia Srivastava, the India-origin Miss Teen USA 2023, has announced her resignation, citing a misalignment of personal values with the direction of the organization.
“After months of grappling with this decision, I have made the choice to resign from the title of Miss Teen USA 2023,” wrote Srivastava in a post on social media. “I look forward to the rest of the year as I finish 11th grade as part of the National Honor Society and start the college application process, knowing that my academic career has been defined by my hard work, and my hard work alone,” she added. She was the first entrant from New Jersey to have been crowned Miss Teen-USA. She resigned her Miss Teen-USA title a day after Miss USA 2023, Noelia Voight, resigned.
The 17-year- old talented diva was born to an Indian father Sanjay Srivastava and mother Barbara, who is from Mexico.
UmaSofia Srivastava represented New Jersey as a first-generation Mexican-Indian American at the national level and was crowned as the Miss New Jersey Teen USA. Later that year, she was crowned as the Miss Teen USA. She authored multilingual The White Jaguar to inspire people of all ages. Srivastava herself speaks many languages.
A pianist herself, she runs a blog too, “That’s Fan Behaviour”, where she shares her experiences as a woman of color and the ongoing events. She also donated 1000 books to inner-city kids in New Jersey through the Bridge of Books Foundation.
