Sunny Leone on Hunger pangs, mountain escapes and what she really thinks of Gen Z

The India 2030 Leadership Conclave 2026 at ITC Maratha, Mumbai, was an evening of recognition, conversation, and more than a few genuine moments that reminded you why these interactions are worth watching. Sunny Leone, who took home the Brand Builder of the Year award in the lifestyle and beauty category, brought exactly that kind of energy to her interaction. Warm and candid, she spoke about food, travel, and a generation that she clearly has a lot of love for.


The interview opened with a simple question about her last cheat meal, and Sunny Leone answered it with complete honesty. "I don't know. I haven't had dinner yet." From there, the conversation about food only got more relatable. She admitted to having what she described as a monster in her stomach, and when asked what she would eat after the event, she did not hold back. Pizza, french fries, pasta. All the bad things, she said, laughing. An answer we can all relate to.

It is a small thing, perhaps, but there is something genuinely refreshing about a person who has built an entire brand around lifestyle and beauty showing up to an event starving and completely at peace with it. No unecessary preaching about clean eating, which is a healthy choice of course. Just a woman who wanted her dinner.

On the topic of travel, Sunny revealed she had been in Kolkata just the day before, flying back that very morning in time for the conclave.

When asked about her favourite destination in India, she gravitated towards the north. The mountains, she said, are where she goes when she needs to breathe. "It's so beautiful just being in the mountains, finding somewhere just gorgeous to relax and decompress." The mountains, and the quiet they bring... sounds heavenly, indeed.


For someone whose life moves at the speed it does, that instinct to seek stillness in high places makes a lot of sense.

The conversation then turned to Gen Z, and rather than offering the predictable mix of praise and gentle concern that tends to follow questions about younger generations, she took a different angle entirely. "I think that slowly as they get older, they're going to find their own path and realize that we were right," she said. "Everything we said was correct. You just put a different label on it."

She was not dismissing Gen Z or talking down to them. She was acknowledging that every generation arrives at the same truths eventually, just through different doors and with different words for what they find there. And then she added something that reframed the whole thing. "They're going to be the ones who are going to inspire us in the future."

Winning the Brand Builder of the Year award in lifestyle and beauty, Sunny Leone brought to the conclave something that cannot really be manufactured or strategised. A genuineness that has clearly been at the core of everything she has built.


The India 2030 Leadership Conclave 2026 celebrated leaders who have shaped their industries and left a mark that goes beyond the obvious. In her own way, on her own terms, Sunny Leone has done exactly that.