Much before all it took to be an influencer was a cellphone, a selfie-stick and an Insta account to post saffron-painted nails or a whoopee dance on a moving train, there was—and is—the real deal. Some are household names. Some make headlines and step back into the shadows. Some prefer to remain there and let their work speak for them.
This International Women’s Day Issue pays homage to the women pathfinders who influence the times. There is neither a particular order of importance nor a category in this list because they are all equals, considering their chosen fields.
Their achievements reflect the aspirations and tools of New India: technology, art and crafts, disability, health and wellness, the environment, scientific discoveries, and growing inherited companies exponentially to become business baronesses. Some of them or their companies have been around for years, if not decades, but the impact of their work remains perennial.
Some of these achievers are to the manor born, like the legacy entrepreneur Nisaba Godrej who grew her company 17 times into a billion-dollar corporate mammoth, but rarely gives interviews or appears at business conclaves. Or Dalit politician Ramya Haridas, who crowdfunded her own campaign and sang her way to victory. There are service innovators like Mehvish Mushtaq, the first Kashmiri woman to develop an Android application called ‘Dial Kashmir’ that provides addresses, contact numbers, and email ids of different essential services and state government departments.
AI-preneur Niti Agarwal created seamlessly communicating chatbots to grow existing businesses. Many she-influencers are from opposite sides of the educational and social spectrum; rural entrepreneur Pariben Rabari invented the new embroidery art form ‘Hari Jari’, and YouCode Intelligence promoter Suriya Prabha K conducts computer thinking camps in government schools in rural Tamil Nadu. These wonder women have raised collectives and export initiatives.
They have brought challenge into the equation: Ladakh’s Thinlas Chorol’s Ladakhi Women’s Travel Company, wholly owned and operated by women, encourages ladies to climb mountains, literally and metaphorically. What unites this band of sisters is the diversity of India’s possibilities and vast resources, which if properly used can empower its citizens, especially women, through direct involvement: for example, the seed fund of `10 lakh for Sumita Ghose’s chic, handcrafted products venture came from investments from 1,000 artists.
Many of these indomitable females have broken the middleman chain: Sobita Tamuli of Assam makes and exports saffron to Japan directly. Online awareness has brought about eco-literacy: low-key Delhi businesswoman Tamanna Sharma operates a successful waste management service provider, especially in the plastic-plagued hills. Coimbatore-based Hemalatha Annamalai’s Ampere Electric has found a profitable niche in manufacturing electric vehicles for waste management.
With struggles, strategies and successes, these ladies of the light inspire India’s women to dare to dream or build on dreams. What they all have in common is imagination and resolve. More power to them.
The Legacy Builder
The Godrej board has five women, the highest number for any listed company in India
It is the dream of every successful industrialist to see their products go global. Nisaba, the daughter of the legendary Adi Godrej, made sure of just that. Now nearly half of her company’s revenue comes from overseas: with market capitalisation up to over $15 billion as of this month. One of the first outlier coups by Nisaba, the Chairperson of Godrej Consumer Products Limited, was creating a niche hair product market exclusively for African women.
The psychology graduate who took the customary inheritor route through UPenn and Harvard Business School was, as of 2023, worth around Rs 1,200 crore. She is a businesswoman who runs a company for women—the Godrej board has five women, the highest number for any listed company in India. The atmosphere at her company has changed since her father’s time; Nisaba is the empowering emancipator for women in the workplace.
At Godrej Industries, flexible hours and work from home is the norm. The company’s return programme which brings mid-management level women to come back to the company they quit is a resounding success that has added more quality control and expertise to the enterprise. Her mojo: a perfect work life balance makes billions.
Outspoken Speaker
Taking on erring politicians even in her party makes her one of Uttarakhand’s most powerful leaders
A lesson learned early by the child of a soldier is to not fear obstacles. Ritu Khanduri Bhushan, the first female Speaker of the Uttarakhand Assembly and the daughter of General BC Khanduri, former CM and Union Minister, stayed true to this principle when she cancelled 228 ad hoc ‘backdoor’ appointments to the Vidhan Sabha, all of relatives of former Speakers from both parties. The Uttarakhand High Court backed her decision.
Her ability to take on powerful politicians even in her own party makes her one of Uttarakhand’s most powerful leaders, She is the first Speaker to establish a designated space for women legislators and Assembly employees to relax during the afternoon break; she had experienced first-hand the inconvenience of lacking such a quiet space to write a speech. The post graduate politician revived the defunct Assembly library and stocked its shelves with books ranging from politics, economics and social sciences. Her next project is to digitise the Assembly proceedings with about Rs 30 crore allotted by the Centre.
Her much-lauded innovation is ‘Yamkeshwar Express’, a school shaped and painted like a train which has attracted new students; kids in her constituency Yamkeshwar had never seen a train. She is for making women self-sufficient: for example Khanduri encouraged a local woman to export 1,000 locally designed sandals woven with indigenous tree fibres to France.
Ritu Khanduri Bhushan
First woman Speaker of the Uttarakhand Assembly
Street Shakti
The conviction rate for sexual offenses in telengana has gone up from four to 35 per cent today
Started in October 2014, SHE (Safety for Her Ensured) Teams was one of the first policing initiatives in India that took a heads-on approach for women’s safety. Headed by IPS officer Swati Lakra, it all began with a single team in Hyderabad; now it is present in all districts of Telangana. Teams of five, both male and female police personnel patrolled public spaces, colleges, bus stops and crowded markets incognito to protect women from harassment.
Using a dedicated hotline number and proactive approach on social media, Lakra and her team tries to change male attitudes and make tormentors aware of the consequences of their actions. Men caught in the act are counselled and cautioned against ill-treating women. In 2016, Lakra led another social gamechanging initiative by setting up Bharosa Centers (Bharosa in Telugu means faith) which helped victims of serious sexual assault. These centres comprise civilians (counsellors, legal advisors, support persons, doctors and nurses) along with a police representative.
The conviction rate for sexual offences has gone up from four to 35 per cent today. The misogynists tried to hit back; in January, cybercriminals created fake profiles of senior cops, including Lakra, on social media and solicited money. The 53-year-old Additional DGP, Telangana State Special Police, Battalions, takes it in her stride, “I saw the opportunity to do something for women who face traumatic issues daily. When I see the relief on their faces, I feel vindicated.” By challenging the gender stereotype of the struggling woman cop, Swati Lakra combines passion with compassion to make streets safe for women.
Mallik Thatipalli
Safety Net
Sunitha Krishnan has been attacked 17 times in her crusade against
human trafficking and sex crimes
Padma Shri awardee. One of Newsweek’s 150 ‘Fearless Women in the World’. Book publisher. And gang rape survivor. Meet 51-year-old Sunitha Krishnan who runs the NGO Prajwala in Hyderabad. Her aim is to stop human trafficking. Her Twitter profile mirrors her straight approach: ‘Padmashree Awardee, Crusader Against Sex Crime & Sex Trafficking’. Krishnan, who became a recognised literacy activist when she was 12—she started a school in slums—was furious that sexually assaulted children and women are made to feel guilty for someone else’s crime.
She was ostracised by her family who berated her for bringing disgrace to their name and other parents would tell their children “to avoid me because a rape survivor is a bad influence”. The outrage transformed her into a champion of violated females with results: the Andhra Pradesh government adopted her recommendations for the rescue and rehabilitation of victims of sexual violence. She has also collaborated with the police department, training cops to intercept sex trafficking.
Krishnan is worried that paedophilia is on the rise since online solicitation is easy; she reportedly said that if a three-year-old child is getting sold to a brothel in India, Cambodia, Thailand or Laos, it means that somebody wants to buy a three-year-old for sex. She has been attacked over 17 times, but such assaults have made her more resilient. Krishnan’s protective philosophy has five rules: prevention, protection, rescue, rehabilitation, and re-integration. Every year she walks barefoot for three months wherever she is in the world to honour the thousands of young victims freed from slavery and to mourn the millions who are still slaves. She says Prajwala’s success rate is 85 per cent. For her it is not enough. The 15 per cent matters.
Bindu Gopal Rao
Travelling Provocateur
A political art personality, she believes in conversations around history, geography, literature, science that shape identities
The art of art lies not in grand shows, but in taking it places. And telling a story. Itinerant art curator Gitanjali Dang is the founder of Khanabadosh, which goes by the catchphrase ‘a Mumbai-based itinerant arts lab’, which travels to places, big and small, to show outlier art and multimedia experiences that force you to think. Her creative life is a social inquisition; one work Love in the Time of Choleric Capitalism, had literary shades that questioned society’s invisible hierarchies.
She is a disruptor, belonging to a diverse group of artists who come together at random to work on projects. Her rebellious, humorous iconoclasm is about persuading change in the way art is perceived, especially among young viewers and creators alike. A political art personality, she believes in conversations around history, geography, literature, science that shape identities; the opening theme of her project called ‘Invisible Light’, Jagte Raho, questions the current Indian political structure that cracks down on dissent.
She defines ‘Late Style’—an elderly artist’s work with its significant past—with tongue firmly in cheek as “the epiphanic moment when a torus a.k.a. doughnut finally recognises that it is homeomorphic. And that it can transform into a coffee mug like receptacle for new ideas.” Go figure.
The Write Stuff
khabar lahariya has designed a course on mobile journalism aimed exclusively at rural women
Kavita Devi, or Kavita Bundelkhandi, as she likes to call herself, was only 12 when she was married off. Now, she is the first and only Dalit member of the Editor’s Guild of India.
She was unlettered, had five siblings and her parents, both Dalit farmers, couldn’t afford to feed so many mouths. A year after becoming a child bride, she defied society and family to enrol at the Mahila Samakhya NGO, which conducted educational classes for uneducated girls and women. Those six months changed her life. The NGO used to bring out a small magazine—Mahila Dakiya—in the local Bundeli language. Devi started working for it in her free time. Years later, still addicted to education, she earned an MA in journalism and co-founded the rural news platform Khabar Lahariya in 2002. All its employees are women from marginalised sections of society, such as Dalits, Adivasis, Muslims, OBCs, etc.
The platform—which started as a newspaper until a fund crunch forced it to become a digital-only site—reaches over 10 million people, and has over 30 reporters. Hers is a novel experiment since most of her journalists have had only primary school education, while some are completely unlettered. Nonetheless, Devi maintains that they are well-versed in community life, societal norms and the geography of the region, which gives them an edge over urban journalists, who have no understanding of rural issues.
Mahila Dakiya had its moment in the sun when a documentary based on the platform, Writing with Fire, was nominated for an Oscar in 2022. The 39-year-old self-made editor also hosts a weekly The Kavita Show. Khabar Lahariya’s USP is to have designed a course on mobile journalism exclusively for rural women. It has trained 270-plus women journalists so far. Over the years, Devi has managed to change the patriarchal perspective that women from the village are only good for being nurses, teachers or ASHA workers.
Tai Chi
At 26, Raksha Khadse was the youngest member of the 16th Lok Sabha in 2014
One of the youngest Bharatiya Janata Party members in the Lok Sabha is a 32-year-old woman from Raver, Maharashtra, called ‘tai’ (elder sister) by her constituents. This is a rare—and heartfelt—tribute for this two-time MP with a perfect political pedigree; her father-in-law is the influential NCP leader Eknath Khadse, himself a six-time legislator on the trot till 2019. Khadse was a computer engineer before she wed into the family. Her grassroots connect is rare in such a privileged politician; she cut her political teeth as a sarpanch and head of the Zila Parishad.
Khadse’s poll posters with two small children in her arms—her husband died young—became social media hits. She is a strong campaigner addressing water shortages in the Jalgaon region; success came when the Centre released the first tranche of Rs 66 crore out of a Rs 500-crore budget to start work on a delayed irrigation plant in her constituency. Her political plank is road connectivity, because she believes infrastructure and education cannot be achieved without that.
Rebellious Notes
Isaivani was a contestant in Bigg Boss Tamil, lasting 50 days in the fifth season of the blockbuster TV show
Isaivani started singing when she was all of six years old. Her father, a self-taught musician, who plays the keyboard, was her creative energy whose meticulous instruction and training gave this singer from Chennai the skill and courage to perform in thousands of shows by the time she was in her early 20s.
Her foray into gaana—a rap-like genre of Tamil music that has evolved over the last two centuries—paid off after the Tamil film industry picked up her music and dispersed it to wider audiences. Isaivani cruised through the audition for the gaana-rooted band, The Casteless Collective, in 2017, in the process becoming the first professional female gaana singer. Three years after that break, Isaivani went a note higher by grabbing the BBC 100 Women Award. Her rise is notable as a symbol of repudiation not just because she’s from a lower caste, but because gaana is a zealously guarded male preserve. The Casteless Collective is unabashedly political, creating songs about issues like the lynching of Dalits or even the Sabarimala temple issue about the entry of women. There’s been a hint of controversy too: Isaivani made headlines after she complained to the police about her ex-husband Sathish using her name to push his own initiatives.
Dalit Melodist
THE YOUNG MP has a stellar Parliamentary record with 72 per cent attendance; she has asked 321 questions compared to the national average of 210
She’s a first-time Lok Sabha member who stormed into the House with a record-breaking victory margin of over 1,50,000 votes from Alathur in Kerala in 2019. At the time, this margin was a greater number than her declared assets of about `22,000. The father of Ramya Haridas, Kerala's second-ever Dalit woman MP, is a daily wage labourer and her mother is a tailor and a long-time Mahila Congress worker.
The only candidate picked by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in a talent hunt, Haridas created a record by crowdfunding her own campaign, raising more than `10 lakh for the Ramya Haridas Challenge Fund. Crowds flocked to hear her melodious voice during her stump speeches. It gets better: Haridas has a stellar Parliamentary record with 72 per cent attendance; she has asked 321 questions compared to the national average of 210.
The parliamentarian identifies her priorities as bringing infrastructure to Alathur, her constituency that has a large population of daily labourers, and where Dalit settlements are in dire circumstances. The way Haridas is going, she could well be India’s next future Dalit woman leader in the Mayawati mould. She is a stern politician, holding the government’s various SC/ST departments accountable for their performance. The only wrinkle so far in her stellar political journey is her stand that women aged between 10-15 should not break tradition by entering the Sabarimala temple.
The C-Suitecase
Radhika Piramal is India’s first openly gay businesswoman
If anyone has got her bag of tricks right, it’s Radhika Piramal. As the turbocharged engine of VIP Industries, India’s largest luggage maker by market share today, she resurrected a dying brand and reinvented it into a modern essential travel accessory rather than just a box you packed clothes and toothpaste in: chic women’s handbags in contemporary colours, sleek suitcases and edgy backpacks became the new normal at VIP.
One of her big successes was launching Skybags with Bollywood brand ambassadors and cutting-edge advertising. India’s first openly gay businesswoman, Radhika is married to Amanda, whom she met in New York. After the 2018 Supreme Court decision to decriminalise homosexual acts between consenting adults, many top Indian companies have enacted inclusion and diversity policies for the LGBTQ community. As a young businesswoman who is one of the big winners and a married lesbian, Radhika could be the poster girl who could influence a positive change in public attitude towards the LGBTQ community and propel legislation to legalise same-sex marriage.
Woman Warrior
She is a member of Women in Cinema Collective's ‘Refuse the Abuse’ campaign against cyber bullying and harassment
Actor, dancer, brand ambassador and organic farmer. Manju Warrier is studying for her next role: politics. The buzz in Kerala, her home state, is that Warrier is a shoo-in for the LDF ticket from the Chalakudy seat. The LDF hasn’t been particularly successful in this constituency, winning only once in the three times that this new seat has seen elections. That time too, it was an actor—Innocent—who gave the Left front a win. Her power stems from her status as a senior celebrity actor who has worked with top stars such as Mammootty, Mohanlal and Dhanush.
She appeared in an ad with Big B. Warrier was named a ‘disruptor’ by Film Companion for her roles portraying bold and path-breaking women. In February, she appeared before the trial court in Ernakulam in a rape case that includes her former husband and actor Dileep, who allegedly violated a well-known actress. When she identified Dileep's voice in an audio recording during the rape, he wanted a re-examination which the judge refused. Manju became a strident voice against the exploitation of women in Mollywood, and is a member of Women in Cinema Collective (WCC)’s ‘Refuse the Abuse’ campaign against cyber bullying and harassment. This goes well with her image as an actor who portrays women you don’t mess with.
Tight Grip
She quit competitive wrestling in protest against the former WFI head Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh
At 31, Sakshi Malik is probably the most well-known wrestler in India. As of now, it has little to do with her 2016 Rio Olympics bronze. Just like how she refused to give up when down on the mat and grabbed victory from the jaws of defeat to bag the first-ever Olympic medal by a woman wrestler for India, she also threw her weight behind the effort of other women wrestlers to bring down former WFI president and politician Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh. In June last year, the BJP MP was accused of sexually harassing six female wrestlers, including a minor, during his time at the head of the WFI. Sakshi maintains that she too was at the receiving end of his harassment.
Defying the system, she joined a protest against Bhushan along with fellow grapplers Bajrang Punia and Vinesh Phogat. Instead of prepping for the Paris 2024 trials, Malik took to the streets, where she rallied, slept and trained for 40 days. Images of the decorated athlete being dragged away by policemen were splashed across media. Her efforts failed to appeal to the conscience of the powers-that-be. But, public outrage forced the six-time BJP strongman to resign from his post as WFI head; he continued to rule by proxy through close aide Sanjay Singh. When Sanjay got 40 out of 47 votes to lead the WFI, Malik hung up her boots and declared her retirement from competitive wrestling. As the Olympic trials come near, Malik refuses to be part of an organisation and game led by Bhushan, and is “mentally tired” after an almost year-long protest.
Cancer Killer
Dr Geetha Manjunath has co-authored the book ‘Moving to the Cloud’ on cloud technologies
An Indian woman is diagnosed with breast cancer every four minutes. In major Indian metros, up to a third of cancer cases is of the breast, with a majority of them being in an advanced stage with poor chance of survival. Many women, especially in rural areas, avoid screening because of accessibility, privacy concerns, high cost or the radiation. AI medical pioneer and IT expert Dr Geetha Manjunath isn’t one to be be numbed into inaction by these horrifying numbers.
The founder and CEO of NIRAMAI (Non-Invasive Risk Assessment with Machine Intelligenc) Health Analytix has developed Thermalytix—an artificial intelligence and machine-learning programme to detect early-stage breast cancer, which is not contact based or invasive. Unlike mammography, Thermalytix can detect breats cancer in women under 45.
The technology has since expanded to detect the parasitic worm that causes river blindness, as well as helping detect fever and respiratory conditions that could mark Covid-19.
Dr Manjunath has figured in the Top 50 NASSCOM IT innovators as well as a Forbes list of Top 20 Self-Made Women in India.
Green Evolutionary
Kollakkayil Devaki Amma planted a sapling every day for decades to make her now-famous forest
When a devastating car crash upended her life, what kept Kollakkayil Devaki Amma’s spirits up was strolling around her house in Muthukulam, Alappuzha. Following her enduring love for farming, which proved difficult to continue after her injuries, Devaki started planting trees in her backyard. One sapling every day, for decades.
Now, this 4.5-acre piece of land is a lush, green forest in a district without forests, and is home to over 3,000 trees, including diverse species such as krishnanal, mahogany, mango, musk, pine, star and tamarind. This man-made forest is also a sanctuary for a variety of birds including Amur falcons, bluethroats, black-winged stilts, paradise flycatchers, and emerald doves. In short, a thriving ecosystem, contributing significantly to the biodiversity of the region. The site has attracted a large number of students, researchers and even tourists keen on learning about social forestry.
For her efforts, Devaki was recognised with several awards, both at the state and the national level, including the prestigious Nari Shakti Puraskar and Indira Priyadarshini Vrikshamitra Award, among others. Her work showcases how individual actions can have a profound impact on the environment. At a time when forests are fast disappearing, Devaki’s story is a call to action for others to contribute to the preservation and enhancement of nature.
Ronnie Kuriakose
Race Winner
Alana Gonmei was honoured with the Delhi Commission for Women’s Achievement Award in 2016
She’s the elder sister that Indians from the Seven Sisters—the states that make up the nation’s Northeast (N-E)—look up to. Alana Gonmei has been fighting discrimination and racial abuse that people from the Northeast unfortunately and regularly face in the National Capital region.
Gonmei, a Naga from Manipur, runs the North East Support Centre and Helpline which she began in 2007. In 2013, she went a step further, establishing the Pann Nu Foundation to combat growing violence against women. Another year of hard work went by, and Gonmei was inducted into the Bezbaruah Committee, set up by the government to suggest measures to deal with racial discrimination against Northeastern Indians. In just a couple of years, Gonmei’s work there was acknowledged: she was honoured with the Delhi Commission for Women’s Achievement Award in 2016.
It was during the Covid pandemic, however, that racial abuse of N-E Indians exploded; Gonmei’s workload went up in proportion. At the early peak of the pandemic, Gonmei, who was herself called ‘coronavirus’ once in a racially twisted reference to the Chinese origin of the virus, was getting 200 calls a day relating to racial abuse of Northeast Indians.
Gonmei is clear: racism is the virus and enforcement of stronger laws against it is the cure.
Financer of Equality
In 2019, Jayshree Vyas became the first independent woman director of the Bombay Stock Exchange
Among the major reasons women have been unable to evade the clutches of patriarchy is the lack of financial independence. That is just what Jayshree Vyas sells at SEWA Bank of which she is the Managing Director. According to the organisation’s website, SEWA focuses on helping “poor women to come out of the vicious cycle of poverty, and build their business, assets and capital”. Vyas, a chartered accountant, has been associated with the Ahmedabad-based SEWA Bank since 1986.
During this time, their member base has increased to over six lakh poor self-employed women, including vegetable vendors, daily wage labourers, tailors, among others. Among the many facilities made available at the SEWA Bank under the leadership of Vyas are insurance and pension. In 1992, Vyas introduced a micro insurance scheme which covered over 1,50,000 members in the first three years.
A housing loan, a micro-pension and savings scheme, all of which were part of SEWA’s financial literacy programme, soon followed. Vyas is a woman who likes to keep up with the changing times. So she also introduced technology training for the bank members. Today 45 per cent of its client base is adept at using UPI for digital monetary transactions.
Pencil Pusher
Menon has called herself an ‘akriologist’ (‘akri’ means garbage in Malayalam) as many of her initiatives use waste material
Lakshmi N Menon likes magic and creating miracles with the mundane, even during tragedies. After the 2018 floods devastated Kerala, sending paper boats with ‘Thank you’ notes to fishermen who voluntarily rescued people in danger seemed a silly idea. But when these boats were placed in flowing water during the monsoon season, there were seeds hidden in them which sprouted into flowering plants.
It doesn’t end there: she floated FriendSHIP. a voluntary life insurance scheme which allows people to pay a yearly premium of just Rs 24 for a cover of Rs 1 lakh, in collaboration with New India Life Assurance Company. Her brand, Pure Living is a sustainability enterprise that sells disposable eco-friendly options to plastic pens and wooden pencils.
Another venture Rolapena makes pens using paper waste from printing presses; her employees are elderly and differently-abled women in the region. Guess what, these pens too hold seeds at one end; plant the pen in the soil after the ink dries out: a unique plant will grow to write the story of revival and hope.
The Shame Difference
Over 1.2 million girls have READ HER book, which IS IN the curriculum of over 7,500 schools across India and is used by almost 300 NGOs
Glora Steinem’s essay If Men Could Menstruate, which celebrates menstruation, has stayed with Aditi Gupta from the time she read it in college. It prompted Gupta, who comes from Garhwa in Jharkhand, to produce similar literature which will help girls avoid their periods as embarrassment and break the vicious circle of taboos and myth around menstruation.
While studying at the National Institute of Design in Gujarat, Gupta met her future husband Tuhin Paul; together they launched a crowdfunding campaign to produce an illustrated comic book for girls on menstruation, titled Menstrupedia. The comic book, released in September 2014, is aimed at girls aged nine and above. It’s a colourful, fun and accessible guide to menstruation and follows the journey of three young girls, busting myths and taboos. It earned the 40-year-old a berth in the Forbes India 30 under 30 list the same year.
Over 1.2 million girls have benefited from the book, which has been integrated into the curriculum of over 7,500 schools across India and is also used by almost 300 NGOs in India, besides being used in 18 countries, impacting the lives of 13 million girls worldwide. The Facebook page has 47K followers and counting. To ensure accuracy, the content has been reviewed by medical professionals.
The website also has a questions section where people can seek answers related to menstruation, besides the Menstrupedia blog offers a collaborative space where people can share their stories. She also runs a certified menstrual education programme and hosts workshops to raise awareness. Gupta’s aim is to let go of shame that surrounds the topic and encourage mothers to bring up “period-positive” daughters.
The Wool Wonders
Namza Couture creations are made with nomad-sourced raw material and woven on traditional paddle looms
It is not often that the under-represented get to bask in the limelight. There are a few, however, spearheading the movement to bring lost practices to the forefront. The founders of Ladakhi fashion label Namza Couture, Padma Yangchan and Jigmet Disket, are one such pair. The two friends, now in their 30s, met in college. Their shared love for Ladakh brought them together and they set up the slow-fashion brand in 2016.
It embodies their commitment to revitalising Ladakh’s craft and textiles and preserving its heritage, even as they embrace contemporary design. The duo burst on to the fashion scene after they showcased their creations at the London Fashion Week in 2019. Soon their local, naturally dyed, hand-spun and hand-woven woolen fabrics with traditional silhouettes and a modern twist were the talk of the town. They use nambu (sheep wool), spuruk (textured sheep wool from the Zanskar region), yak wool and camel wool, which are sourced from the nomads of Changthang. The clothes are exclusively manufactured in Ladakh, where the fabrics are woven by local craftspeople who employ traditional paddle looms to create intricate patterns and textures, encapsulating the essence of the region’s culture and heritage.
“Collaborating with skilled artisans ensures the authenticity and quality of our creations, and in this way, we also give back to our native land,” they say. Recently actor Sonam Kapoor Ahuja was seen in the brand’s mogos (a traditional formal gown for women) and bok cape at the pre-wedding festivities of billionaire industrialist Mukesh Ambani’s son Anant.
Sister Earth
Before becoming a businesswoman, she worked as a corporate trainer at salary of Rs 1,200 per day
The birth of a son in 2016 led to an epiphany for Ghazal Alagh—realising the dearth of toxin-free baby products—resulting in the creation of Mamaearth. Over the last eight years, this brand that started with selling baby products has now evolved into a larger wellness and beauty brand with over 500 products for skin, hair and more. Mamaearth is the only Made-Safe certified brand in Asia. Interestingly, Alagh does not have the qualifications believed to be
a prerequisite for someone launching a startup—an IIT-IIM pedigree, which makes her journey all the more inspiring. The Panjab University pass out epitomises the anybody-can-do-it spirit. From earning
a meager salary of Rs 1,200 per day as a corporate trainer, she has managed to build an empire with a current net worth of Rs 9,800 crore, under the aegis of Honasa company that comprises five brands—Mamaearth, The Derma Co, Aqualogica, Ayuga, BBlunt and Dr Sheth’s. The parent company opened its shares to the public in October last year. Alagh’s other claim to fame is as a shark in the first season of Shark Tank India. Besides a display of business acumen, Alagh’s success is also a vindication of the deft use of social media. She regularly posts about the new products as she tries them out live, reinforcing the importance of transparency with customers.
Give and Tech
Shah gave up a seat at one of US’s top law schools to pursue a career in micro-financing
If Digital India had a poster child, it would have to be Jaipur-based Frontier Markets founded by Ajaita Shah. The entrepreneur established the social tech commerce enterprise in 2011 to help “high quality, climate-friendly and gender-inclusive products and services” reach the remotest corners of rural India. Till date, the company has successfully delivered 50 million products to five lakh customers.
Empowerment of rural women is a big part of the ethos of Frontier Markets, which is why Shah ensured that the enterprise’s workforce consists exclusively of women. Over the years, the brand has created a Saheli network—digitally skilled local rural women influencers who promote the products, assist with e-commerce purchases, and collect rich insights on customer demands and needs—of over 35,000 women. A company report states that Frontier Sahelis earn four times the income from any other similar programme in the country.
After launching a Meri Saheli Mobile app (an assisted e-commerce facility) in 2018, Shah expanded her initiative to three more states—Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Odisha—in 2019. During the Covid years of 2020-21, she added doorstep delivery to the list of their services. The latest feather in Shah’s cap was placed when Frontier Markets signed partnerships with UPSRLM, DoIT Rajasthan & SSP (Maharashtra) last year.
The Housekeeper
Sneha Choudhry loves cooking vegan dishes and is fond of travelling
She’s solid gold, right from her medal at IIM, Kozhikode to her entrepreneurial career. With just the right mix of education and experience—at Deloitte and Oracle—Sneha Choudhry has redefined living away from home with Zolo, previously known as ZoloStays. A co-living app that offers ready-to-use rooms and beds, Zolo has done away with the problems like long-term rentals and utility payment issues. The pandemic saw Zolo step-up to the plate and help thousands of temporarily displaced persons. No wonder then, it has a net worth in excess of $100 million now, with operations across 10 cities.
An icon for woman entrepreneurs, Choudhry champions work-life balance, with uniqueness being the keyword and harmony the context in which it is etched out. In that sense, she is
a glimpse of a future where women shine in new fields, breaking through the ceiling that society imposes, and adapting life and work to their own needs and lifestyle.
The Lightwalker
Chidvilasananda means ‘the bliss of the play of consciousness’
It was Swami Muktananda, the founder of Siddha Yoga, who chose and anointed Malti Shetty for a life of spiritual conquest.
Shetty was born in 1955 in Mangaluru to a restauranteur couple. By the time she was five, her parents had taken her to Swami Muktananda Paramhansa at his ashram in Ganeshpuri, some 100 km from Mumbai. At age 14, Shetty renounced the ordinary life and entered the ashram as an ascetic of the Saraswati order.
Having started as an English translator for the guru, Shetty was named by Swami Muktananda as his successor, along with her brother Subhash Shetty, or Swami Nityananda, in 1982. Her monastic name is Swami Chidvilasananda, but devotees and seekers began to call her Gurumayi, meaning ‘immersed in the guru’. The succession didn’t play out so well after Swami Muktananda died the same year. Her brother quit the Siddha Yoga tradition three years later, amid rumours and insinuations of impropriety.
The guru in Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love—feminine, multi-lingual, university-educated—is widely believed to be Gurumayi. She is now the unquestioned guru of Siddha Yoga, with the headquarters of the SYDA Foundation in Fallsburg, New York. Gurumayi’s humanitarian PRASAD Project, which works closely with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations has conducted effective programmes of health, education and sustainable community development in India and overseas.
It works “to preserve endangered texts from the religious and philosophical traditions of classical India and make them accessible for study and scholarship worldwide”. Among her celebrity disciples are Meg Ryan, Melanie Griffith, Isabella Rossellini, Diana Ross, Lisa Kudrow, and Lulu.
The Thin Red Line
Among many reasons for Minakshi Mukherjee’s popularity as a politician is her provincial dialect
Minakshi Mukherjee is the Great Red Hope of the Communist dream in Bengal. The state secretary of the DYFI, the CPI (M)’s youth wing, and the first woman to hold the post came into the limelight in 2021 when she was fielded from the high-profile Nandigram constituency against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and BJP’s Suvendu Adhikari. Even though she lost, her popularity as a leader meant she was anointed captain of the mission to resurrect the Left in Bengal by her party.
Hailing from the industrial town of Kulti in Asansol, Mukherjee started her political career with Student’s Federation of India at Burdwan University where she completed a master’s degree in political science. She has since climbed up the political ladder with an impressive show of her leadership as well as public speaking skills.
Only recently, on the final day of the CPI (M)’s 300 km-long Insaaf Yatra, lakhs of people gathered at Brigade in Kolkata to listen to the 39-year-old's rousing oratory in her provincial dialect; a skill Mamata had mastered well before. Mukherjee’s rising role in the Left was further illustrated by Ganashakti, the Left mouthpiece in Bengal carrying her image on its front page two days in a row, an unusual honour for a youth leader.
The Root of Things
She worked with the UN for 15 years
On the sidelines of a busy road in Jharkhand’s capital city, Ranchi, a slow revolution is afoot. Since 2017, Aruna Tirkey has been running her tribal cuisine restaurant, Ajam Emba, which means ‘great taste’ in the Kudukh language of her Oraon tribe. Before she ventured into the food business, the 50-year-old was working for the UN for implementation of forest rights in India. “Sometime in 2016, I participated in a cooking contest, where I made some dishes that I had grown up eating. I ended up with the first prize,” she smiles.
In less than a year, she had travelled the world to popularise the tribal cuisine of Jharkhand. Encouraged by the positive feedback, she opened the doors to her restaurant and was inundated with patrons craving authentic flavours. Dishes such as ragi chilka, madua momo, a preparation of the local sanai flower, dhuska, etc. became the world's introduction to Jharkhand' epuicuran tradition. She is a sustainability champion. The food is prepared using forgotten indigenous recipes, cooked in earthen pots over wood fires, and served on sal leaves.
Tirkey recalls,“My parents have been a big influence on me. I would often watch my father forage for leafy greens like chakod and katai saag. He would stress the nutrition level in local produce. I wanted to share this knowledge with others, hence the restaurant.” Tirkey is also the founder of the Jharkhand Slow Food community. “Farmers have stopped growing native crops. Since I cook with such ingredients, I need a constant and healthy supply. Over the years, I have convinced many to grow native crops like gondhli (a type of millet),” she says, adding, “My aim is to promote Adivasi food and assert ownership.”
Peak Performance
Vani Kola has summited Mt Kilimanjaro and run several marathons too
What’s common to Myntra, VIA, Apps Daily, Zivame, Power2SME, Bluestone and Urban Ladder? Answer: Venture capitalist Vani Kola. With her company, Kalaari Capitals—the name stems from the word Kalaripayattu, a Malayalee martial arts form which embodies commitment, strength, persistence and perseverance—Kola has funded over 50 companies in the e-commerce, mobile services and healthcare service in India. Entrepreneurship comes naturally to the 60-year-old; after all she believes that it is all about the mindset. A few years after she moved to the US from Hyderabad, she set up RightWorks in 1996, an e-procurement company which she later sold in 2001.
Not one to rest on her laurels, she founded NthOrbit, a company dealing with supply-chain software developing, which brought out a software called Certus later purchased by PepsiCo in 2005. It was time to head home. In 2006, she laid out the basis for her firm Kalaari, which came to fruition in 2011. It was labeled the second-largest firm in India by assets and the biggest run by a woman. Since its founding in 2011, Kalaari has invested in over 90 ventures.
Keen to build a tribe of women, she spearheaded the initiative, CXXO, which promotes and supports female founder-CEO-led startups by giving them access to capital, mentorship, and a community of like-minded leaders. For this fitness enthusiast who scaled Mt Kilimanjaro in the 2000s and took up running in her 30s, strategy, vision, capacity to grow, self-confidence and being good listeners and learners are the markers of a successful entrepreneur. Marvel superhero Tony Stark’s statement—“Sometimes you gotta run before you can learn how to walk”—is what she swears by.
High Energy
She has edited Lilavati’s Daughters, a collection of biographical essays on women scientists from India
When Rohini Godbole was pursuing her doctoral thesis in theoretical particle physics at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, her relatives back home in a small town in Pune district told her that she would not find a husband. Evidently, Godbole had bigger plans than marriage, for which she received the Padma Shri, the Stree Shakti Award and the Ordre National du Merite, an important French award for distinguished individuals.
A professor at the Centre for High Energy Physics at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore now, she specialises in elementary particle physics, field theory and phenomenology. She was part of the team of scientists looking for the Higgs particle, resulting in the stupendous discovery in 2013 that particles have mass.
Statistically, women make only 15 per cent of science faculty positions, and only 14 per cent of government scientists are women. In her TEDx talks, she has exposed the biases against female scientists. Her aim is to bust the myth that science is a male domain; she advises women scientists to beat the odds, and what better way than to lead by example.
Owe Yes!
She succesfully lobbied the government to revise the Air Passenger Charter Act
As a little girl, Akanksha Anshu aspired to be a journalist. Fate had other plans, however, and she ended up studying to be an engineer. While working in the IT sector, Anshu took a flight to Bengaluru in 2014. It changed her career trajectory. The flight got cancelled, and what struck her was the fact that the airline was far from being helpful. It got her thinking. She delved into research and realized that though air passengers have rights in India, almost 99 per cent of the population is unaware of them.
This prompted Anshu to create a platform through which such rights would be easily accessible to the common man. After nearly two years of research, she founded Refundme in 2016. But her work was not over. There were many loopholes in the airlines industry operations, and government policy on passenger rights was far from helpful. There was no compensation for flight delays, poor baggage handling, frequent cases of lost baggage and so on.
In 2017, she appealed to the government to fill the lacunae. It was a rewarding moment when the Centre revised the Air Passenger Charter Act in 2019 and included the missing compensation bit. While Anshu has been at the forefront of this crusade, she has often gone on record to state how the business sector is prejudiced against women in business. She has admitted to funding challenges too. But she’s not giving up. As she believes, “No journey is flawless.”
Shot and Sweet
She was the face of Kerala government’s Covid-19 vaccination drive
In 2017, Dr Shimna Azeez, then a medical officer at Manjeri Medical College in Malappuram, injected herself with the Measles-Rubella (MR) vaccine in front of anti-vaxxer parents at a school. She told them it was a life-saving injection. That one episode was a gamechanger in Kerala’s extensive MR vaccination drive. Local media hailed her bravery and the vaccination effort got a shot in the arm.
To take on the non-believers, Azeez and a team of doctors started Infoclinic, a Facebook page, which publishes articles and posts to educate people and dispels misconceptions. The same year, it bagged the Indian Medical Association’s social media award for their work. Azeez reiterates that their fight is against superstition and blind faith on quacks.
Today, the page has 112K followers and counting, and has also evolved into a website. An accomplished public speak and published writer with two books to her credit, Azeez is bent on dispelling the cloud of misinformation around medical science. She was also the face of the Kerala government’s Covid-19 awareness and vaccination drive. At present, she works as a consultant with the WHO in northern Kerala.
The Best Fit
She quit a high-paying job at Yes Bank to embark on her high-risk startup journey
Jyoti Dabas was a high performer at school who got the right degree (in engineering from Warwick University followed by an MBA at IIM, Calcutta) and the right jobs (first as a tech analyst with CITIgroup, then at Yes Bank). One day she found her true calling—combining fitness and business—that led her to establish not one but two institutions in the sector.
While the Institute of Nutrition and Fitness Sciences provides comprehensive and practical knowledge in Health and Fitness through education, Fittr (also backed by actor Suniel Shetty) connects like-minded people seeking and offering a healthier lifestyle.
Dabas’s success story can be considered a blueprint for anyone aspiring for entrepreneurial success. It shows how perseverance, even if it takes almost a decade, can bear fruits. Fittr, as reported in January, has been clocking an annual recurring revenue run rate of Rs 120 crore. Now, Dabas, along with her co-founders, is looking at a public listing for the brand.
Global Networker
AT DAVOS, she curated three panel discussions ON CRITICAL WOMEN’S ISSUES
Stuti Jalan founded Crosshairs Communication, a public relations firm, at the age of 23. And in the last decade-and-a-half, the organisation has grown by leaps and bounds.
But Stuti wanted Crosshairs Communication to be more than just a PR firm. The outcome was the Women’s International Network (WIN), which Jalan founded during the pandemic with the objective of “inspiring women in India, and connecting aspiring women leaders from different walks of life”. In a span of over two years, WIN has already become a community of over 5,000 women. Jalan founded the digital platform to “democratise access to unending inspiration and positivity through webinars, Instagram Live sessions, and other women networking events”.
Her latest feat is taking WIN to Davos for the World Economic Forum 2024, where she curated three panel discussions on “critical issues in women’s leadership, sustainability, innovation, and the transformative prowess of women in the realm of Artificial Intelligence (AI)”.
Stuti jalan
Founder, Crosshairs Communication
Her People’s Voice
Jacinta Kerketta has, on principle, refused an award from a major media house
Born in 1983 in Khudaposh, a village in Jharkhand’s West Singhbhum district, 41-year-old Jacinta Kerketta’s pen sings of the trials and tribulations of adivasi life. In November last year, a national media house awarded Kerketta a literary prize, which the adivasi poet declined as she believes that Indian media, in general, doesn’t focus on tribal issues.
As she trains her eye on the struggle of indigenous communities against threats from infrastructure and mining projects, Kerketta makes it a point to engage with young tribal girls and encourage them to go beyond their structured lives. Discussions revolve around the adivasi way of life; religion, education, etc. Her efforts have paid off as many girls from the village of Kachchabari in Khunti district have refused child marriages, and have started going to school and decided against leaving the village to work in the cities.
Kerketta’s tryst with the systemic persecution of tribal people began in her teens. Her maternal uncle and grandmother were victims of superstition—her uncle was lynched by a mob and her grandmother was jailed. The incident spurned this second-generation graduate from her community (the Oraon tribe of Jharkhand) to pick up the pen and fight injustice.
Kerketta believes that it is important that issues of gender politics and the struggle of indigenous communities to save their water, forests and land should come to the forefront. According to her, it can only happen from the inside out. Kerketta also believes in starting such education early. She writes short poems for children, published in the magazine Cycle brought out by the Bhopal-based Iktara Trust to raise awareness about tribal life and legacy. The adivasi voice is the true voice is her motto and mojo.