BEIJING, Jan. 15 (Xinhua) -- The first Mr. Gay China pageant due to start Friday night in Beijing was cancelled, an organizer said minutes before its scheduled opening.

    Organizer Niu Niu said the event was called off because of application problems.

    Another organizer Ben Zhang told Xinhua earlier that they hadn't applied to the government to hold the event.

    An audience of around 200 was expected to attend the pageant set to take place in a Beijing nightclub.

    Organizers earlier said the Mr. Gay China Pageant would include a fashion show and a question and answer round.

    "The pageant will let people know more about gays and help our society to understand them better," said Zhang Beichuan, a Chinese scholar on homosexual studies, Friday.

    Surveys showed that people who knew gays in person had much greater acceptance of the gay community, the scholar told Xinhua.

    Sociologist Li Yinhe with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences has estimated that there were 36 to 48 million homosexuals in China.