SAN­DRA L BLOOD

Hav­ing en­tered the 2026 Chut­ney So­ca Monarch (CSM) com­pe­ti­tion as a wild card, Savi­ta Singh de­fied ex­pec­ta­tions and si­lenced doubters, emerg­ing as the Chut­ney So­ca Monarch with her hit song The Ring. Her vic­to­ry at the grand fi­nals on Feb­ru­ary 8 se­cured her the cov­et­ed ti­tle and a $400,000 prize, but more im­por­tant­ly, it marked the start of a his­toric and fast-ris­ing chap­ter in her mu­si­cal jour­ney.

De­spite pub­lic de­bate and crit­i­cism that fol­lowed the an­nounce­ment of her win, Singh has re­mained res­olute. She has em­braced the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of rep­re­sent­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go and the chut­ney so­ca tra­di­tion with dig­ni­ty.

“Not every­one needs to know the chap­ters of my life to see the strength in my spir­it,” Singh said. “Fear­less, strong, and en­tire­ly my own, my strength is my shield and I am fear­less be­cause of what I’ve sur­vived. I am un­break­able.”

Her mes­sage re­flects both per­son­al re­silience and a deep sense of cul­tur­al du­ty—qual­i­ties that have long de­fined the chut­ney so­ca move­ment, a genre root­ed in In­do-Caribbean her­itage and shaped by gen­er­a­tions of per­form­ers de­ter­mined to keep it vi­brant and rel­e­vant.

Ac­cord­ing to a Feb­ru­ary 24 re­lease from the CSM or­gan­i­sa­tion, Singh has wast­ed no time step­ping in­to her role as cul­tur­al am­bas­sador. Since her coro­na­tion, she has em­barked on an in­ter­na­tion­al tour, bring­ing chut­ney so­ca to au­di­ences far be­yond the Caribbean di­as­po­ra.

CSM founder and di­rec­tor George Singh not­ed that the reign­ing monarch head­lined Valen­tine’s Bash in New Zealand on Feb­ru­ary 14, per­form­ing be­fore a sold-out au­di­ence. Her ap­pear­ance made his­to­ry, as she be­came the first Trinidad and To­ba­go chut­ney so­ca artiste to per­form in New Zealand, open­ing new path­ways for the genre on the glob­al stage.

“My first time vis­it­ing and per­form­ing in New Zealand has been noth­ing short of amaz­ing,” Singh shared. “You all have be­come a beau­ti­ful chap­ter in my jour­ney, and I am so grate­ful for the over­whelm­ing love and sup­port. I will for­ev­er car­ry these mem­o­ries with me as I con­tin­ue to strive to keep our cul­ture alive and spread joy through mu­sic.”

Fol­low­ing her New Zealand de­but, Singh trav­elled to Hol­land for week­end per­for­mances and is sched­uled to ap­pear in St Kitts to­mor­row, con­tin­u­ing a de­mand­ing sched­ule that un­der­scores the grow­ing in­ter­na­tion­al ap­petite for chut­ney so­ca.

Her achieve­ment car­ries ad­di­tion­al his­tor­i­cal sig­nif­i­cance. Singh is now the first adult fe­male per­former to be crowned Queen of Chut­ney So­ca, join­ing the record books along­side Katelin Sul­tan, who pre­vi­ous­ly made his­to­ry as the com­pe­ti­tion’s first mi­nor Queen at just eight years old. Singh’s win rep­re­sents a break­through mo­ment for fe­male chut­ney so­ca artistes, who have tra­di­tion­al­ly faced bar­ri­ers in a male-dom­i­nat­ed per­for­mance are­na.

The Chut­ney So­ca Monarch com­pe­ti­tion it­self has played a piv­otal role in el­e­vat­ing the genre since its in­cep­tion, help­ing trans­form chut­ney so­ca from a niche cul­tur­al ex­pres­sion in­to a main­stream Car­ni­val at­trac­tion with in­ter­na­tion­al reach. Singh’s vic­to­ry con­tin­ues that evo­lu­tion, sig­nalling both con­ti­nu­ity and change with­in the tra­di­tion.

Be­yond the ac­co­lades and mile­stones, Singh’s out­look re­mains ground­ed in a mes­sage of uni­ty and pos­i­tiv­i­ty. “The heart be­comes a beau­ti­ful place when filled with love,” she said—words that echo the spir­it of chut­ney so­ca it­self, a genre born from sto­ry­telling, cel­e­bra­tion, and shared cul­tur­al iden­ti­ty.