Siyatha Miss Sri Lanka for Miss World 2017

Published : 9:38 am July 28, 2017

Where Beauty and Charity meet

The Siyatha Miss Sri Lanka for Miss World 2017 will be held this September

By Kamanthi Wickramasinghe 

Preparations are underway to pull off the fifth edition of the Siyatha Miss Sri Lanka for Miss World pageant in grand style. Following the theme ‘Beauty With A Purpose’, the pageant focuses on giving an opportunity for local beauties who are ready to make a difference in the community. Over the years the pageant has evolved in to one of the most anticipated events in the fashion calendar.

Two rounds of auditions concluded for this year’s event presented by Model Shop in association with Siyatha TV and Kiss FM. Model Shop for the fifth consecutive year has joined hands with industry experts to bring out the talents of young Sri Lankan beauties. Its directors including Sangeetha Weeraratne, Shereen Kumaratunga and Dhananjaya Bandara have worked with much dedication to make this pageant a success. Speaking to the Daily Mirror Life, Sangeetha Weeraratne said that there were over 500 applications for this year’s pageant. “The final 20 have been chosen from the two rounds of auditions we had and we are trying to focus more on the theme this year. The Miss World pageant is not only about beauty but it’s also about giving back to the community. The international pageant has also introduced a new challenge titled ‘Head-to-Head challenge’ where the contestants have to do a presentation about them and they will also have questions on an online platform. So they will be marked according to their answers. The contestants will have to undergo eight weeks of training to improve their personality, fitness, communication skills and other skills.”

This year’s mini pageants will be done in par with international standards thereby giving an opportunity for the contestants to get a sense of the international event as well. In his comments, renowned bridal dress designer Dhananjaya Bandara said that local contestants especially from rural areas do not come for these pageants. “We want to highlight their talents but once they come to these pageants they want to step in to the modeling field but not do anything for their community. So we want to ensure that beauty and serving the community goes hand-in-hand. Hence we have to improve their skills in terms of communication, fitness and groom them well. Some of them either fear or don’t have a good fluency in English and that’s one of the major challenges we face. We also have to educate them on current events in order to improve their general knowledge. So it’s a tough process we have to go through during the next few weeks. But with the team of experts working with us, we are positive about pulling off another one of those grand pageants.”
Pics by Kushan Pathiraja

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