Kaziah Liz Mejo's rise to the Miss Universe India 2026 crown reads less as an overnight breakthrough and more as the outcome of a childhood that ran, in parallel, along three tracks — classical dance, academics, and pageantry — from her early years in the UAE onward.

Her family roots are in Karipuzha, Mavelikkara, in Kerala's Alappuzha district, where her parents Mejo Abraham and Suja Mejo are natives. She grew up, however, in Abu Dhabi, moving through Emirates National School, the all-girls St Joseph's School and finally the Abu Dhabi Indian School in Al Wathba, where she completed Grade 12. In interviews she has described the frequent school changes as formative — "I was constantly switching schools. But one thing I constantly felt was always at home" — an early lesson in adapting to new environments that arguably carries over into the composure demanded of a pageant contestant.

Her mother enrolled her in classical dance classes and local "baby shows" in Abu Dhabi from a very young age, and she has since accumulated more than twelve years of formal training. To that foundation she has added the violin, the drums, singing, and karate — the last of these carried up to brown-belt level. Her first professional screen appearance came in a character role in the Malayalam-language film Shylock, opposite Mammootty.

Her pageant journey followed a clear ladder rather than a lucky break. She first won Miss India Planet 2022, then trained through Gleamdiva Academy — a specialist pageant-preparation academy — before entering Miss Teen Diva 2023–24 as one of the national finalists profiled in Beauty High Magazine. On 17 April 2024, at Zee Studios in Jaipur, she was crowned Miss Teen Diva 2024 and Miss Teen International India 2024, becoming only the second Kerala girl to win the Miss Teen Diva title (after Aishwarya Vinu Nair in 2020). She went on to represent India at the international Miss Teen International 2025 pageant, where she finished as 1st runner-up.

Around age 17, she made the deliberate choice to move back to India on her own to begin a law degree in Bengaluru, describing it as an attempt to "ground her representation in the everyday realities of the country." In May 2026 she won the Beena Kannan Couture Miss Universe Kerala 2026 title at the Grand Hyatt Kochi Bolgatty, which qualified her for the national contest. Three months later, on 23 August 2026, she emerged as the winner from a field of 52 finalists at Miss Universe India 2026, chosen by a jury that included Bollywood actor and India's first Miss Universe Sushmita Sen, actor and former Miss Universe India Urvashi Rautela, Miss Universe India 2024 Rhea Singha, environmentalist and film producer Pragya Kapoor, and former Miss Universe India and Miss Universe runner-up Celina Jaitly.

Beyond the crown, Kaziah has used her platform to speak candidly about issues that most contestants avoid. In interviews with Khaleej Times and The New Indian Express, she described three years of her adolescence during which she could not bring herself to keep a single unfiltered photograph of herself — a public discussion of body dysmorphia that is unusually direct for a beauty-pageant winner. She has also worked with SpiritEcoHealth on sustainability in menstrual hygiene, and was earlier presented with an award for excellence by Dr. Shashi Tharoor.

She now begins preparations for the 75th Miss Universe pageant, scheduled for November 2026 in San Juan, Puerto Rico, where she will attempt to bring India its fourth Miss Universe crown after Sushmita Sen (1994), Lara Dutta (2000) and Harnaaz Sandhu (2021).

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