Ines Ligron was not pleased with The Japan Times. In particular, she was unhappy with an editorial suggesting that the winners of the Miss Universe contest are "celebrities of the fluffier variety."

Ligron's job is to organize and promote the Miss Universe Japan contest. She tries hard to convince people that it is more than a parade of bimbos hankering after a year's worth of freebies. She tries hard to assure people that Miss Universe Japan and the eventual Miss Universe herself are women of substance and not just pretty faces attached to nice bodies and the various trinkets that come with winning.

As evidence, she produced before me a case-winning trump card: Lara Dutta, Miss Universe 2000.

Of course, Dutta is beautiful, and she was in Japan for a trinket promotion blitz, although she would dispute the labeling of Maurice Lacroix's glitzy, upmarket watches as trinkets -- the Milos Integral line she was promoting costs up to $6,000.

However, Maurice Lacroix's regional director, Thomas Morf, knew which side of the debate he was on.

"We came to the conclusion that only the most beautiful woman in the world would suit Maurice Lacroix," he gushed.

Perhaps, but such a characterization belittles Miss Universe. As Ligron reminded me earlier in the week, the contest is about personality as well as looks.

"For me, it's important that the girl is smart," the Frenchwoman explained. "If she's representing Japan -- or any country -- it would be embarrassing if she couldn't string two words together."

Last year's Miss Universe Japan, Satomi Ogawa, proved Ligron's point by stunning onlookers not only with her beguiling looks, but her amazing voice.

A karaoke queen? Not quite. Ogawa is not only very pretty, she is also planning to become an opera singer and is currently studying at Tokyo College of Music.

A one-off? This year, I attended the Miss Universe Japan contest in March. It had the usual parades around the catwalk with different creations dreamed up by top fashion designers, including a stunning lingerie section, but it also had a segment devoted to trying to find out where these girls are coming from, and, perhaps more importantly, where they are going.

Let's make one thing clear: These girls are not all rocket scientists. Several stumbled through the interview routine, some resorted to giggling, others cried. Let's face it, it's an ordeal thinking on your feet before 2,000 people.

Well, that's what I thought until Mayu Endo, who came in 14th in the Miss Universe contest in May, sat on the interrogation sofa.

"What have you been doing recently, and what are your plans for the future?" the little interviewer squeaked.

"Well I graduated from MIT in Boston and I've been accepted to do postgraduate studies in architecture at Harvard," the 23-year-old Wellesley College graduate replied in flawless English. In fact, she was probably the most qualified person in the building.

Dutta came in first. And when you meet her, you soon understand why.

OK, she's beautiful, but like Miss Universe Japan, she probably wasn't the most beautiful girl in the competition.

What Endo and Dutta have in buckets is usually termed "attitude." Call it pizzazz, if you want; self-confidence, perhaps.

What it amounts to is substance. Maurice Lacroix might only have been thinking about "the most beautiful woman in the world"; what it got was a slick, intelligent, one-woman promotion department. At a reception at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo to promote the company's watches, Dutta put on a spontaneous PR show that had Morf drooling on the sidelines (he was thinking about watches). Dutta has got more poise and self-assurance than an Israeli tank.

"It's most important for me to come across as a real person, not someone who's going to fall apart the moment she's touched," the 22-year-old emphasized with the style and assurance of a corporate woman.

Morf is probably not the only drooling. The Miss Universe marque is owned by Donald Trump and CBS Inc. Bumbling bimbos they don't need (well, maybe Donald does). What they get is in-your-face beauty with in-your-mind brains.

Dutta is the daughter of a retired wing commander in the Indian Air Force (her sister is a pilot in the air force) and a mother of British/German descent. She graduated in economics and mass communications and is planning to do a master's degree in journalism and filmmaking at Columbia or NYU. She is currently based in New York (where she shares an apartment in the Trump Plaza with Miss USA). But despite her bicultural background and peripatetic lifestyle, her heart remains in India.

"If I had to pick a place to live, I would live in India," Dutta told me. "If I had a family and children, I would like to bring them up with traditional Indian values and have a sense of belonging."

Dutta, who grew up in a progressive and supportive family in which she had the freedom to set her own goals and standards, finds no conflict between being Miss Universe and being a traditional Indian girl.

"You can't change some people's attitudes of looking at things, but I think people realize now that international pageants have gone beyond the Barbie doll image to a complete package," she pointed out.

"People are looking at them now as an exchange of cultures. You have to represent your country and deal with a variety of causes and issues; it takes more than a pretty face."

Dutta's "official" cause is AIDS and she is also, as the Japan Times editorial noted, a United Nations ambassador dealing with population issues. She also supports Face to Face, which deals with empowering women to control their own lives, mainly in underdeveloped countries.

Nevertheless, being dubbed "the most beautiful woman in the world" is not always easy to live up to.

"Sometimes you feel like a fish in a bowl," she admitted. "But it's a full-time job with responsibilities. It has its ups and downs, but the positives outweigh the negatives."