"A woman who is absolutely confident in her own skin there is nothing more beautiful than her. Regardless of what colour she is, what size she is, what weight she is if she is absolutely confident of herself and knows who she is, that is beautiful."
The 41-year-old is on board as a mentor for LIVA Miss Diva 2020. She says her job as a mentor will be done well if she would be able to share her experience of 19 years with the contestants.
"The best part of being a mentor is the time that I spend with the girls and being able to share my experience which I have gained over the past 19 years. The life lessons they learn here, if they can apply it regardless of what phase of life that they are at, it will be a job done well for me," Lara tells life.
"Every single year we try to get the girls embrace their own individual personalities and find the confidence to be themselves and express that," she says.
However, not being able to select 20 winners, is what she says is the most difficult part of being a mentor.
"Out of 20 girls, I need to select only three and send the 17 others home. Every year it absolutely kills me."
She believes that to win any beauty contest, "you have to have the ability to break stereotypes".
"You need to go against the grain and you need to have the confidence to do that. I see lots of girls who come and say the same thing which previous winners have said, they behave the same way. I always say that I'm not looking for cookie cutter. The most common mistake which models do on the ramp is trying to be Lara Dutta, Priyanka Chopra or Aishwarya Rai or Sushmita Sen," says Lara.
(Puja Gupta can be contacted at puja.g@.in)
( With inputs from IANS )