Pooja Chopra is Femina Miss India 2009

Pooja Chopra wons Pantaloons Femina Miss India 2009 award while Ekta Choudhury became Miss India Universe 2009. The two beauties have lots of potential to make a mark on world stage.

Miss India is an important beauty contest in India. It is also famous for churning beauties who represent India in international beauty contests including Miss World and Miss Universe.

The year 1994 was a landmark year for the pageant industry in India Sushmita Sen won the Miss Universe title after winning the Miss India crown. Sushmita Sen became the first Indian woman ever to win the Miss Universe crown.

The same year the runner-up of Miss India, Aishwarya Rai, won the Miss World title. Both the Miss Universe and Miss World contests were won by Miss Indias Sushmita Sen (Miss India) and Aishwarya (Miss India 94 runner-up) respectively. Today Rai is a global star and a leading Bollywood actress.

The success of Sushmita Sen spawned a lot of coaching institutions which were set up to groom girls in pageant participation skills. The number of participants in the preliminary rounds of the pageant has increased considerably. Miss India World 1997, Diana Hayden won the title of Miss World 1997.Pageant winners are also groomed for months in preparation for the international contest. In 1999, the Miss India winner Yukta Mookhey went on to win the Miss World that year.

The year 2000 was another landmark year for Miss India. Three of the Miss India winners happened to win their respective international pageants - Lara Dutta (Miss Universe), Priyanka Chopra (Miss World) and Diya Mirza (Miss Asia-Pacific). This was a huge success. The only other country to have won all three major titles in one year was Australia in 1972.

Pooja Chopra was crowned Miss India World and Shriya Kishore is Miss India Earth 2009.

The contestants dazzled the event in beautiful creations by designers Ritu Kumar, Rocky S., Pantaloons (designed by Rajesh and Anirban) and Prasad Bidappa.

The show was choreographed by Marc Robinson and hosted by Bollywood beauty Malaika Arora Khan and star R. Madhavan.