Jai Singh will also make history by representing India for the first time ever at the 2025 ASI Contest Best Sommelier of Asia & Pacific in Malaysia and the 2026 ASI Contest Best Sommelier of the World in Portugal. Held every 3 years by the International Sommelier Association (ASI) of which Sommelier Association of India is a member, it had crowned the Late Gerard Basset as the World’s Best Sommelier in 2010.

There were initially 16 Sommeliers slated to contest but eventually only 14 participated. After intense quarter-finals and semi-finals, the grand finale saw Jai Singh crowned as the “2025 SAI Best Sommelier of India”, with Pankaj Singh and Amber Deshmukh securing second and third places at the elimination rounds held at Hotel Lalit on 23 January, 2025.

The top three winners will now embark on an exciting journey—attending the prestigious ASI Education Boot Camp in Singapore this July. This will help the three hone up their skills further and bring them up to international standard of excellence and give each of them an opportunity to grab the title eventually. As Nina Besset FIH, Co-Founding Trustee of Gérard Basset Foundation stressed in her opening remarks, her late husband had made 6 attempts before winning the coveted Title, sharpening his skills at every attempt. Therefore, this was a ground level effort for the Indian participants and more is yet to come their way.

Also Read : Opportunity to compete on 23 January to become ‘Best Sommelier in the World’ in 2026

The inaugural competition serving as the national qualifier for top international platforms, drew talented sommeliers from across India and Indian Sommeliers working in Dubai, Maldives, Singapore, Italy, New Zealand and International cruise ships.

Amrita Singh, the MW student from Mumbai, who currently resides in Bordeaux and is a co-founder and President of SAI which has done an enviable job of organising the competition in less than a year of setting up the Association, said that the level of skill and passion displayed during the competition, gave them the confidence that Indian sommeliers were ready to shine on the world stage.

Mattia Antonio Cianca, Co-Founder and Vice-President of the Sommeliers Association of India and Best Sommelier of Australia in 2017 and Italy in 2019 said that the participants were on the cusp of achieving outstanding success on the international stage.

Also Read : SAI organises Best Sommelier of India 2025 Competition for World Stage

Credit goes to Charles Donnadieu, Corporate Sommelier of The LaLit Suri Hospitality Group, who came from Delhi with his team to organise the event as the hospitality partners. Though the Lalit wine team is well lubricated under the stewardship of this French Sommelier of over 9 years,  Charles was humble in admitting that Keshav Suri, Executive Director of the Lalit Group was the inspiration for the wine programs and was very supportive of their wine initiatives in the country.

The dinner was hosted in the Lawn of the Hotel with excellent cuisine from their 4 restaurants in Mumbai. There was plenty of wine poured by Good Drop Wine, Angel’s Share, Rad Elan, Fratelli Vineyards, Grover Zampa Vineyards and Vallonné. The largest producer Sula and the Luxe sparkling wine producer Chandon were conspicuous by their absence, though.

SAI was formed last year and the first thing they did after completing the basic formalities was to align with The Association de la Sommellerie Internationale (ASI) and convince them to recognize SAI as the international body who will be able to send the candidates for the regional titles and the World title so that they could organise this competition and compete for the world title which is held every three years. It was great to welcome Saiko Tamura-Soga, Vice President of the Asia and Pacific Region as their representative and have her as one of the judges.

Kudos to Sommelier Association of India (SAI) for covering several steps in the very first year; On to putting the Best Sommelier of World soon from India.

Also Read : SAI: Newly formed Sommeliers Association of India thinks Global

Jai Ho!

Subhash Arora