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STORIES OF WOMEN
ENTREPRENEURS
LEADING CHANGE
TRANSFORMING INDIA 2019 TRANSFORMING INDIA 2019
STORIES OF WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS
LEADING CHANGE
In partnership with
Designed by Creative Inc Dr. Rajiv Kumar
Vice Chairman, NITI Aayog
Mr. Amitabh Kant
CEO, NITI Aayog
ForewordMessage
The International Women’s Day is celebrated on 08 March
every year to reflect on the strides made towards a gender
equal society and calls for action on bridging the remaining
gaps. It is also an occasion to celebrate women doing
extraordinary work. The theme of this year’s International
Women’s Day is “I am Generation Equality: Realizing Women’s
Rights” and is closely aligned with NITI Aayog’s ‘Strategy
for New India @ 75’. NITI Aayog is committed to creating
an enabling environment for women sans institutional and
structural barriers and improving India’s female labour force
participation.
The Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP) is one such
effort to empower women across India to realize their
entrepreneurial aspirations and gain access to resources.
NITI Aayog aims to develop WEP to become a single point
of access to information and services relevant to women
entrepreneurs at different stages of their journeys. The
platform achieves this by working closely with its partner
organizations to develop customized information resources,
capacity building programmes and linkages to services that
are relevant to women entrepreneurs.
While the lack of access to resources and mentorship is
being actively addressed through WEP’s multivariate service
offerings, the need to create more role models for women
to look up to and be inspired has also been identified. The
Women Transforming India (WTI) Awards addresses this
The shift of a large proportion of India’s population from
job seekers to risk takers and employment generators
through startups has propelled India on a path of economic
boom and growth. Startups have emerged as engines of
growth for our economy. Over the last five years, India has
seen the emergence of over 60,000 new enterprises which
are contributing to the nation’s growth and development.
The last two decades have witnessed the Indian society
become progressively inclusive, with active efforts to bridge
gender based inequalities. Despite this progress, women
only constitute around 14% of the total entrepreneurs in the
country.
The country’s economic growth has much to gain if women,
who constitute 48% of the population, can exercise their
agency beyond the domestic realm. However, women
continue to be inhibited from entering the formal workforce
due to deeply entrenched socio-cultural expectations
and inadequate access to relevant knowledge and skills.
Entrepreneurship provides the latitude for women to earn their
livelihood on their own terms and gain financial independence
in the process.
Cognizance of the scope of entrepreneurship to stimulate
socio-economic development has led to a pan India adoption
of policies and programs targeted at building a catalytic
environment for entrepreneurs. I ardently believe that only a
nation that encourages the full and unhindered participation
need by recognizing exceptional women from both commercial
and social sectors. Since 2018, the WTI Awards have been
hosted under the ambit of WEP and have had a special focus on
entrepreneurship.
These Awards are NITI Aayog’s initiative to highlight the
commendable and ground breaking endeavours of India’s most
innovative and hard working entrepreneurs. I am pleased by the
enthusiastic response and am highly impressed by the quality
of the applicants this year. I congratulate the Top 30 for making
it through a comprehensive evaluation process and wish them
the best of luck for their journey ahead.
We at NITI Aayog hope to keep providing more support as
WEP grows and look forward to supporting more women
entrepreneurs who would like to contribute to nation building.
I would also complement the NITI Aayog team lead by Anna
Roy in making WEP and WTI Awards such great success. I wish
them all the best. Jai Hind!
of women in economic and political life can reach its potential
to transform society. For India to channel a positive disruption
to her startup ecosystem, it is imperative to create an enabling
environment for women entrepreneurs.
Since its announcement over two years ago at the Global
Entrepreneurship Summit, the ‘Women Entrepreneurship
Platform’ has become a forum dedicated to educating, enabling
and empowering women entrepreneurs. The platform has
become a one stop solution for women to access information
relating to funding, incubation, capacity building and
compliance. WEP has also created a community of women
entrepreneurs, which serves as a support system to enable
mentorship, peer learning and improved access to information.
Under the umbrella of the WEP, the Women Transforming India
Awards is an initiative to celebrate India’s female pioneers. The
changemakers that the Awards recognize are challenging social
expectations to break the glass ceiling and drive India towards a
gender equal society.
The thirty women featured in this book are trailblazers in
their own right and are representative of India’s exceptional
entrepreneurial ambitions and capabilities. I look forward to
WEP’s successful engagement with these women leaders as
we continue to support them in their endeavours. I wish Anna
Roy and her team at NITI Aayog the very best for all future
endeavours of WEP. Introduction to WTI
Awards
Launched in 2016, the Women Transforming India
(WTI) Awards mark NITI Aayog’s annual endeavour to
recognize exceptional women changemakers in the
country. The Fourth Edition of the WTI Awards hosted
under the Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP),
was announced in August 2019 and built on last year’s
theme of ‘Women and Entrepreneurship’. At the time of
closing of the applications for the Awards in November
2019, NITI Aayog had received an overwhelming
response from across the country. The applicant pool
was as competitive and impressive as it was diverse
and inspiring.
The selection of the top women entrepreneurs was
an elaborate task that saw the coming together of
WEP’s community of partners and mentors. For the
first round of evaluations, the WEP team undertook
a rigorous appraisal of all applications to shortlist
this year’s Top 130 women entrepreneurs with the
assistance of PwC - our evaluation partners.
In the second round, the Top 130 were invited to
present their journeys to a panel of WEP’s Jury
members on 06 December, 2019. The Jury comprised
of thought leaders and industry experts across
various fields who evaluated the presentations
of the shortlisted 130. After a day of meticulous
assessments, the Jury whittled the list down to the Top
30 women entrepreneurs from the applicants.
This cohort of WTI’s Top 30 women constitutes an
impressive array of trail blazers who have led strong
business models or made groundbreaking innovations,
shattering the glass ceilings to achieve success. The
selection of the 15 winners called for a final day of
deliberations on the impact created by these women’s
remarkable initiatives as well as their personal stories
and struggles. In the last stage of evaluation, these
30 entrepreneurs were invited to NITI Aayog on 15
December, 2019, where a Super Jury comprised of
industry leaders were called upon to determine the
winners for this edition of the WTI Awards.
The Super Jury round was followed by a pitching
session wherein the Top 30 had a chance to present
before social impact investors, angel investors as
well as venture capitalists for funding. The exercise
sought to harness the insights of the investors
to provide funding guidance and support through
subsequently planned sessions that will connect
women entrepreneurs with potential investors.
Over the course of the last several months, the WEP
team has worked to ensure that the WTI Awards
recognize these incredible women, their perseverance,
tenacity and hard work which have helped them
emerge as winners in their own right.
It is important to note that this journey would not have
been possible without the support of our partners
who were ever so forthcoming with their assistance
and guidance. We would like to thank you all for your
constant support to the WEP family and look forward
to collaborating on our efforts to inform, enable and
empower the women entrepreneurs of this country.
Message
Ms. Anna Roy
Chairperson WEP,
Senior Adviser, NITI Aayog
Realizing India’s dream of becoming a five trillion dollar
economy is possible only with the active participation
of her female workforce. Women entrepreneurs are
revolutionizing the country by taking the lead in fields
that have traditionally been dominated by men. While
women have increasingly become more active in the
entrepreneurial landscape, the success of women
entrepreneurs is often inhibited by socio-cultural norms.
The information asymmetry amplifies the issue of
access to requisite knowledge and services. It thus
becomes critical to not only encourage women in their
entrepreneurial journey, but to also support them in
overcoming systemic barriers and contextual challenges.
Launched on the International Women’s Day in 2018,
the Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP) has been
envisioned as a novel unified access portal for women
entrepreneurs. WEP strives to improve industry linkages
and awareness of existing programs and services and
provide access to peer support, learning resources, funding
and mentorship.
In the span of just two years, WEP has observed
several success stories. The platform has more than
14,000 registered women entrepreneurs and more than
30 partners supporting capacity building, providing
compliance, taxation, mentorship and funding support.
WEP has been recognising the achievements of India’s
leading women changemakers through NITI Aayog’s
flagship initiative - the Women Transforming India (WTI)
Awards. Since 2016 the awards have been celebrating
stories of exemplary women leaders from across India who
are breaking the glass ceiling.
The Fourth Edition of the Awards, launched in August 2019,
focused on the theme “Women and Entrepreneurship” and
received more than 2,300 entries. Through a rigorous three
stage independent process, we have identified the top 30
finalists, all of whom have been path breakers in their own
right. Leading industry leaders have helped NITI Aayog in
selecting this cohort of WTI winners.
This coffee table book is an effort to showcase the
heartening stories of grit, determination, hard work and
success of the women who are leading a new wave of
change. Radhika Kaul Batra
Chief of Staff, UN Resident
Coordinator’s Office
C. P. Gurnani
CEO and Manging Director,
Tech Mahindra
Anjali Bansal
Founder, Avaana Capital
Amit Chandra
Chairman and Managing
Director, Bain Capital
Super Jury
Members
Namita Thapar
Executive Director Emcure
Pharmaceuticals and CEO- YEA!
(Young Entrepreneurs Academy India)
Chetna Gala Sinha
Founder / Chair, Mann Deshi
Bank & Mann Deshi Foundation
Debjani Ghosh
President, NASSCOM
Mira Kulkarni
Chairman and Managing
Director, Forest Essentials
Ronnie Screwvala
Co-founder and Chairman,
upGrad
Shobana Kamineni
Executive Vice-Chairperson,
Apollo Hospitals Enterprise
Limited
Lakshmi Puri
Former Assistant Secretary-
General, United Nations
Renata Dessallien
United Nations Resident
Coordinator in India
Anand Sherkhane
Additional Development
Commissioner, Ministry of Micro,
Small and Medium Enterprises
Roopa Kudva
Managing Director, Omidyar
Network India Mukund Khadgi
Assistant General Manager,
Bank of Baroda
Raman Sidhu
Co-founder and President,
PAFI
Raghavendra Singh
Joint President, Head –
Group Public Affairs, Kotak
Mahindra Bank Limited
Nakul Saxena
Director – Public Policy,
iSPIRT Foundation
Nath Parmeshwar
Director, PayPal india
Nandita Mishra
Economic Adviser, Ministry
of Corporate Affairs,
Govt. of India
Mudit Narain
Programme Director,
Atal Innovation Mission,
NITI Aayog
Mukesh Mohan Gupta
President, Chamber of
Indian Micro Small & Medium
Enterprises
Anasuya Gupta
Chairperson and
Managing Director, CICO
Technologies Ltd.
Ajay Khanna
Chief Strategic & Public Affairs,
Group Ombudsperson, Jubilant
Bhartia Group
Jury
Members
Deepti Ravula
CEO, WE Hub
Anirban Gupta
Co-founder, Dhriiti - The
Courage Within
Anjana Menon
CEO, Content Pixies
Ashish Desai
CEO, Jumo India
Asomee Dutta Baruah
Chief Functionary &
Secretary General,
Sreemanta Sankar Mission
of Guwahati
Gurinder Singh Malik
Distinguished Scientist &
DG(R&D) (DRDO) (Retd) &
Advisor, MHRD
Kanneganti Rama Devi
President, Association of
Lady Entrepreneurs of India
Raman Uberoi
Senior Advisor, CRISIL
Limited
Saachi Bhalla
Program Officer, Policy &
Strategic Partnerships, BMGF
Shivani Malik
Director - Marketing,
Da Milano
Shriya Sethi
Director, International
Innovation Corps,
UChicago Trust
Jyotsna Sitling, IFoS
Principal Chief Conservator of
Forests, Govt. of Uttarakhand
Sneha Jain
Founder & Trustee,
Daanish India Foundation
Jagdish Mitra
Chief Strategy Officer
and Head of Growth, Tech
Mahindra
Urvashi Khemka
Vice Chairman - The Global
Education & Leadership
Foundation (tGELF)
Usha Sangwan
Board Member, Bombay
Stock Exchange
Yatin K Thakur
Chairman, GEN India
Upasna Dash
CEO & Founder, Jajabor
Brand Consultancy
Swarandeep Singh
Kambo
Lead - Investments and
Community, UNLEASH
Shwetank Verma
Co-founder and General
Partner, Leo Capital
Sangeeta Gupta
Senior VP, NASSCOM
CA Kawaljit Singh Oberoi
Proprietor, K.S. Oberoi & Co.,
Chartered Accountants,
New Delhi
Sayantani Mukherjee
Women’s Entrepreneurship
& Financial Inclusion
Associate, UNDP
Gayatree Anand
Chief Minister’s Urban
Leaders Fellow, Delhi
Government
Julia Karst
Project head, Project
Her&Now, GIZ Contents
Ensuring Quality and
Improving Performance
DR. ANUPRIYA BALIKAI
SPOOKFISH INNOVATION
20
Creating Inclusive
Playgrounds for Children
with Disabilities
ADITI AGARWAL
GUDGUDEE
16
Providing Clean Drinking
Water Through Cost-
Effective Technologies
DR. SUPHIYA KHAN
DRUMLINS WATER
TECHNOLOGY
28
Educate, Enable, Empower:
Building a Better Future for
India’s Women
DR. ARMIDA
FERNANDEZ
SNEHA
22
Destigmatizing Menstrual
Health and Hygiene
ADITI GUPTA
MENSTRUPEDIA
18
Hybrid Cooling Systems, Paving
the Way Towards a Sustainable
Future
DR. PRIYANKA
MOKSHMAR, VAAYU
HOME APPLIANCES
26
Eliminating Poverty:
Hand in Hand
DR. KALPANA SANKAR
HAND IN HAND
24
Transforming Education in
Ladakh
SUJATA SAHU
17000 FT FOUNDATION
74
Innovating Food Techonolgies
to Empower Rural Communities
SHAIKH RAZIYA
BASTAR FOODS
62
Making Learning Fun and
Engaging
SNEHA SUNDARAM
KUTUKI
72
Creating Inclusion Through
Greater Accessiblity
SHILPI KAPOOR
BARRIERBREAK
64
Technology that Ensures
Safe Drinking Water
SHILPA MALIK
BIOSCAN RESEARCH
66
Upskilling Healthcare’s
Frontline Workers
SHRUTIKA GIRDHAR
BODHI HEALTH
EDUCATION
68
Making Traditional Jewellery
Aspirational
SHUCHI PANDYA
PIPA BELLA
ACCESSORIES
70
Empowering Farmers Through
Mushroom Farming
JAYANTI PRADHAN
GOPAL BIOTECH AGRO FARM
30
Saving Lives Through
Crowdfunding
KHUSHBOO JAIN
IMPACT GURU
34
India’s First Commercial
Tissue Bank
DR. JUGNU JAIN
SAPIEN BIOSCIENCES
32
Protecting Farmer Livelihoods
and Reducing Crop Wastage
NIDHI PANT
S4S TECHNOLOGIES
42
Making Hostel Life Secure
MADHAVI SHANKAR
SPACEBASIC INC
36
Plastic Waste — Fueling
a Better Tomorrow
DR. MEDHA TADPATRIKAR
RUDRA, ENVIRONMENTAL
SOLUTION INDIA
38
Providing Internet
for All
DR. NEHA SATAK
ASTROME
TECHNOLOGIES
40
Making At-Home Composting
Fun and Practical
POONAM BIR KASTURI
DAILY DUMP
44
Empowering Small-Scale
Farmers Through Technology
and Fair Trade Markets
RUCHI JAIN
TARU NATURALS
58
Increasing Access to Potable
Water
RITUPARNA DAS
HYDROTECH SOLUTIONS
56
Building a Movement of
Leaders to Transform the
Education System
SHAHEEN MISTRI,
TEACH FOR INDIA
60
Empowering the Specially
Abled to Live Life with
Dignity and Independence
DR. RADHIKE KHANNA
OM CREATIONS TRUST
48
Providing End-to-End R&D
Solutions to the Food Industry
RINKA BANERJEE, THINKING
FORKS CONSULTING
54
Transforming India’s
Neonatal Care
PRATYUSHA PAREDDY
NEMOCARE WELLNESS
46
Revolutionizing India’s
Education Landscape - One
Teacher at a Time
RAMYA VENKATARAMAN
CENTRE FOR TEACHER
ACCREDITATION (CENTA)
50
Reuse it or Refuse it…Beat
Plastic Pollution
RHEA MAZUMDAR
SINGHAL, ECOWARE
SOLUTIONS
52 WOMEN
TRANSFORMING
INDIA 2019
STORIES OF WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS
LEADING CHANGE 1617
While taking a college course on Design for
Special Needs, Aditi Agarwal realised the
lack of outdoor play options for children with
special needs during their formative years.
At Gudgudee, Aditi attempts to reinvent the
concept of a playground, allowing for it to
be accessible and enjoyable for children
with disabilities. Focusing on the needs and
challenges of these children, Aditi and her
co-founder Anjali Menon create a playground
that integrates the magic of sound, smell,
touch and visuals to create exciting
experiences for kids with special needs.
Aditi Agarwal
Gudgudee, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Creating
Inclusive
Playgrounds
for Children
with
Disabilities
Gudgudee also offers customised design
services and has been creating an
ecosystem around design for play and
recently organized the International Play
Conference. Since its inception, the company
has been able to build 40 playgrounds in 16
cities across India. Aditi has also brought to
light the stigma around physical disabilities,
attempting to destigmatize the issue and
empower millions of Indian children who
have such disabilities.
Gudgudee works with
occupational therapists,
child physiologists and
teachers to design
play areas that suit the
developmental needs of
the children with special
needs 1819
Destigmatizing
Menstrual Health and
Hygiene
Aditi Gupta
Menstrupedia, Ahmedabad, Gujarat
Growing up in a middle-class conservative
family, Aditi Gupta, like many girls in India,
was no stranger to the stigma around
menstruation and menstrual hygiene. Due to
the taboo on menstruation, Aditi would resort
to using cloth in place of sanitary napkins, as
it was a shame for the family to speak of their
menstruating daughter and unthinkable for
them to purchase the required goods.
Such experiences and the accompanying
frustrations, coupled with her growing
knowledge of menstrual care and hygiene,
empowered Aditi to found Menstrupedia.
Through this initiative, Aditi works diligently
to educate and destigmatize menstrual health
and hygiene amongst the communities in
India. Menstrupedia creates comic books
in eight different Indian languages, as well
as foreign languages, on menstrual health
information. The comics have been well
received across the board and have registered
well with young girls, parents, and teachers.
She has received a lot of recognition and
acclaim with patrons of her cause even
contributing funds. The support and praise
garnered by Menstrupedia underlines the
impact that such an initiative can have on the
Indian society where such topics are usually
swept under the rug.
Menstrupedia is a small
but definitive step to
shatter the myths and
misconceptions around
menstruation 2021
Ensuring
Quality and
Improving
Performance
India is a fast growing consumer economy. With
increased consumption of goods, society becomes
more wary of product and packaging standards.
Spookfish attempts to be transparent with
consumers and reassures them about the quality
of product packaging across India. The company
conducts quality inspections predominantly in the
food & beverage and pharmaceutical industries.
Through this venture, Dr. Anupriya Balikai, the
Managing Director of Spookfish Innovations,
attempts to create a standard for products and to
ensure quality control for food packaging.
Spookfish Innovations focuses on manufacturing
inspection machines that are retrofitted and
integrated into existing manufacturing lines - with
the ability to inspect over 240 bottles per minute
and 15,000 tablets per minute. Applying the latest
computer vision technology and machine learning
techniques, they deploy cutting edge, intelligent
solutions, ensuring that their clients are a step
ahead of competition.
Dr. Anupriya Balikai
Spookfish Innovation, Bengaluru, Karnataka
Spookfish Innovations envisions using
cutting edge, intelligent solutions to change
the face of industrial automation 2223
Educate, Enable,
Empower: Building
a Better Future for
India’s Women
Dr Armida Fernandez
SNEHA, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Dr. Armida Fernandez’s experience as a
medical professional exposed her to the
health risks that mothers and babies face
at birth and immediately after. With her
knowledge of neonatal and maternal care,
Dr. Fernandez set up Asia’s first milk bank
at Sion Hospital in 1989. After learning of
an incident involving a six-year old child’s
rape, she felt the need to empower women
by providing them with information and
outlets that could protect them. In the 1990s,
Dr. Fernandez went on to create SNEHA, an
entity dedicated to educating women on the
problems they face domestically, as well as
empowering them to appropriately deal with
such situations.
The objectives of SNEHA are to change
the mindsets and practices in maternal
and adolescent health, and to educate the
Indian society on maternal care. Through the
initiatives of SNEHA, Dr. Fernandez attempts
to improve maternal health awareness and
health-seeking behaviors.
SNEHA shares the
twin goals of improving
health-seeking behaviour
among underserved
communities and
enhancing the quality of
public healthcare 2425
Dr. Kalpana Sankar
Hand in Hand, Chennai, Tamil Nadu
Holding a double doctorate in Nuclear
Physics and Gender Issues, Dr. Kalpana
Sankar has been actively involved in the
realm of female empowerment for over
two decades. Dr. Sankar helped establish
Hand in Hand, an organisation dedicated
to empowering the most marginalised
and impoverished women in India through
capacity building and training. Dr. Sankar
has been able to mobilize and empower
women across geographies ranging from
India, Afghanistan, Cambodia to Brazil and
South Africa.
Hand in Hand has provided disadvantaged
women with the opportunity to gain
financial, functional, and digital literacy
training. In addition to the trainings, Dr.
Sankar works with the Government of India
to bridge gaps between women in rural
India and access to government schemes
that can help them overcome poverty. Her
dedication has helped alleviate women
from poverty as well as create jobs.
Eliminating Poverty:
Hand in Hand
Hand In Hand works
to educate and
upskill rural women
to fight poverty and
gender inequality 2627
Hybrid Cooling
Systems,
Paving the
Way Towards
a Sustainable
Future
Dr. Priyanka Mokshmar is the co-founder
of Vaayu Home Appliances. The company
provides a cheap and environmentally
viable alternative to home cooling
systems. Vaayu has created and patented
the technology of their hybrid AC-cum-
cooler unit. While running a home-based
business, Priyanka and her husband
ended up paying high electricity bills and
identified that this was primarily due to the
use of the AC.
Through many years of trial and error and
even selling her home to fund their dream
of creating Vaayu Home Appliances,
the company began operations in 2014.
Still, Dr. Mokshmar continued to face
tribulations throughout her journey.
Whether it was her pursuit to attain funding
for Vaayu, or being taken seriously as a
woman, she faced several challenges
every day but soldiered on. Leveraging her
expertise in marketing and management
she was able to receive Rs. 1 Crore in
funding, under the collateral-free GCTMSE
scheme from the state government of
Madhya Pradesh.
Today, Vaayu Home Appliances
provides economically affordable and
environmentally feasible alternatives to
traditional AC units across India - selling
their products from Madhya Pradesh to
Maharashtra and Delhi.
Dr. Priyanka Mokshmar
Vaayu Home Appliances, Indore, Madhya Pradesh
Vaayu India uses
technology to provide
novel home cooling
solutions that are
affordable and
environment friendly 2829
Dr. Suphiya Khan
Drumlins Water Technology, Jaipur, Rajasthan
Providing Clean Drinking
Water Through Cost-
Effective Technologies
Although the field of biotechnology is
infamously known as a hard industry for
businesses to flourish, it did not stop Dr.
Suphiya Khan from founding Drumlins
Water Technology. As a professor of
biotechnology, she worked in areas of DNA
fingerprinting, chemoprofiling, development
of nano-adsorbents and Fluoride (F)
phytoremediation technology.
Her startup focuses on water purification
as well as water distribution among
communities in India. Fluoride is a
major contributor to the world climate
crisis, affecting over 200 million people
worldwide. Existing methods to deal with
fluoride in water are either too nascent
in their testing or too expensive to be
implemented in developing countries.
Not only has her company helped its
beneficiaries access clean drinking water,
it has also helped develop cost-effective
defluoridation technology for both rural and
urban communities in India.
Drumlins focuses
on developing cost-
effective, portable,
environment & user-
friendly techniques
to reduce the serious
public health risks
posed by Flouride
contaminants 3031
Jayanti Pradhan
Gopal Biotech Agro Farm, Bargarh, Orissa
The cultivation of paddy mushrooms has been a lucrative
arena for landless farmers to earn a steady livelihood.
Jayanti Pradhan, an agro-processor and farmer from
Odisha wanted to challenge the regressive stereotype of
farmers being uneducated.
Education was always important in Jayanti’s
household - her father also a farmer, studied
economics in college, however had failed to
complete his education. But he ensured that Jayanti
finished her education. Jayanti went on to study
botany, which aided her knowledge and skills in
farming. With her deepened knowledge, Jayanti was
able to scale her family’s farming business through
breeding mushrooms. Her successful practices were
then shared with other farmers in her community,
leading to this form of crop harvesting becoming
their main source of earnings.
Jayanti acknowledges the struggles rural female
farmers face, as she too has experienced
discrimination. To combat such mindsets, Jayanti
is focused on educating women in her community
and equipping them with the tools and knowledge
of mushroom farming to enable them to become
financially independent.
Empowering
Farmers
Through
Mushroom
Farming
By sharing best
practices on
mushroom farming and
bee keeping, Gopal
Biotech Agro Farms
has helped establish
120 self-help groups
for women, paving the
way for their financial
independence 3233
India’s First
Commercial
Tissue Bank
In recent years Indian startups have been
able to better India’s healthcare systems
by leaps and bounds. However, the one
key area that had remained untouched
until recently was tissue-banks. Dr.
Jugnu Jain, founder and CSO, of Sapien
Biosciences has addressed this need for
tissue-banks in India. Her previous career in
pharmaceuticals allowed her to realize the
great demand for bio-banks that exist in the
Indian market. As India’s first central bio-
bank, Sapien Biosciences has been able to
collect and use medical waste for research
and development of new diagnostics,
drugs, and reagents.
The pioneering tissue-bank has also
been successful in using medical waste
to create medical innovations. Although
Dr. Jain has faced several challenges
in leading the first tissue-bank in India,
she continues to persevere, conducting
biosample curation and R&D services
that are contributing to path breaking
discoveries in the pharmaceutical industry.
Dr. Jugnu Jain
Sapien Biosciences, Hyderabad, Telangana
Sapien Biosciences
aims to develop a high
quality bio-repository,
by employing human
translational platforms,
to pave the way for
new age healthcare
solutions 3435
Saving Lives Through
Crowdfunding
Khushboo Jain
Impact Guru, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Access to medical treatment in India
is improving with time. However,
patients’ ability to pay for treatments
has remained a pressing problem that
was not tackled until Khushboo Jain
created ImpactGuru. Her organization
is a crowdfunding platform that
empowers individuals, non-governmental
organisations (NGOs), and social
enterprises, by helping them raise funds
for healthcare, social, and personal
needs, from family, friends as well as
strangers. ImpactGuru attempts to
provide crowdfunding opportunities to
those who live below the poverty line,
as well as middle class patients who
have exhausted their financial resources
due to out-of-pocket expenditure on the
treatment of their illnesses.
ImpactGuru’s platform enables
crowdfunding to take place entirely
online. People in need of funds draft a
story and upload pictures/videos via
this novel AI-supported story builder for
medical fundraisers. Started in 2014,
ImpactGuru is now one of India’s largest
crowdfunding entities, contributing
to inspiring social change. It aims to
impact 1 million patient lives in the
upcoming 5 years and foresees getting
the attention of over 15 million donors.
ImpactGuru helps
individuals, NGOs
and social enterprises
to raise funds for
healthcare, social
and personal needs
through crowdfunding 3637
Making Hostel Life
Secure
SpaceBasic is a company focused on
tackling the administrative processes college
students face, such as permission slips, data
management etc. All these processes are very
labour intensive and time consuming.
To solve this problem, SpaceBasic leveraged
technology to digitise these processes.
Madhavi Shankar, the Co-founder and CEO of
the company helped develop an application
that houses all the needed information
and clubs all processes that take place
in a college campus. The company
ensures safety checks and allows for
communication channels, keeping all
features accessible to students, faculty and
parents. SpaceBasics now provides their
services to over 60 institutions and 1.2 lakh
users across India.
Madhavi Shankar
SpaceBasic Inc, Bengaluru, Karnataka
The SpaceBasic
platform enables
transparent ways to
connect, collaborate
and execute day-to-day
tasks within student
housing communities 3839
Plastic Waste — Fueling a
Better Tomorrow
Dr. Medha Tadpatrikar
Rudra Environmental Solution India
Pune, Maharashtra
India produces roughly 26,000 tonnes
of plastic waste daily. Knowing the
consequences that non-recycled plastics
can have on human beings, Dr. Medha
Tadpatrikar decided to utilize plastic in its
entirety. By reversing the process through
which plastic is acquired, Dr. Tadpatrikar
was able to create poly-fuel. After much
trial and error, and testing many iterations
of her procedure in her own kitchen, Dr.
Tadpatrikar successfully created fuel
from plastic through the Thermo Catalytic
Depolarization process.
Not only has Dr. Tadpatrikar tackled the
issue of plastic waste disposal, she has
also provided people in Pune’s villages
with an alternative fuel source. Across
the villages of Pune, she discovered that
households were unable to buy kerosene
due to its unaffordability. She decided to
solve this problem by selling her poly-fuel
at a much cheaper price. Through her
company, Rudra Environmental Solution
India, Dr. Tadpatrikar has been able to
collect 7,50,000 kg of plastic waste till
date.
Rudra believes
technology and
innovation are the key
to solving the biggest
social, environmental
and economic
challenges that India
and the world face 4041
Dr. Neha Satak
Astrome Technologies, Bengaluru, Karnataka
As a young nation, India’s growing
population seeks access to internet and
broadband services. However, advances
in this field still exclude a significant
section of the population - the rural
communities. Dr. Neha Satak, who holds
a PhD from Texas A&M University in
Aerospace Engineering, attempts to
solve this problem through her company,
Astrome. Astrome has created a new
concept of providing internet to those in
rural communities through launching a
constellation of 198 satellites into the Low
Earth Orbit (LEO).
Her patented millimeter wave technology
is said to be revolutionary, and is set
to provide lightning speed broadband
internet of 50 to 400 Mbps even in Tier 2
and Tier 3 cities. With a sound focus on
core technology apart from innovative
business solutions, this disruptive
solution has the potential to transform
more than 4 billion lives across
the globe.
Providing Internet
for All
Astrome endeavours
to provide broadband
internet service to the
most remote locations
in India with their
patented millimeter
wave technology 4243
Protecting Farmer
Livelihoods and Reducing
Crop Wastage
Nidhi Pant
S4S Technologies, Mumbai, Maharashtra
The perishable nature of crops impacts farmers
enormously. They often sell their products for
cheaper prices later in the day as a relatively
large portion of what they produce rots and
turns to waste. To combat this issue around
waste and farmer living standards, Nidhi Pant,
who leads the Science for Society team, has
helped create measures to minimise crop
waste and improve farmers’ livelihoods. Their
innovative idea of selling dehydrated vegetable
snacks is being consumed by more than 10 lakh
people across India.
Farmer suicide is a growing problem in Indian
society and the distress associated with
owning land and creating a steady flow of
income is evident. S4S Technologies provides
the relevant technology to farmers to preserve
their crops through dehydration, creating an
alternate stream of income and protecting their
livelihoods.
S4S Technologies’
solar conduction dryers
increase vegetable shelf
life to six months and
enable rural women
micro-entrepreneurs to
enhance the quality of
farm produce 4445
Poonam Bir Kasturi
Daily Dump, Bengaluru, Karnataka
Founded by Poonam Bir Kasturi in 2006,
the Daily Dump focuses on building
products and services for decentralised
waste management in homes, community
offices and public spaces. Where many did
not see composting as a mode of waste
management, Poonam firmly believed in its
merit. This designer from National Institute
of Design (NID) has brought together
design thinking, traditional pottery and the
science of composting to lessen the load
on public agencies dealing with garbage.
Daily Dump also provides its urban
audience a fun, simple and innovative way
to save the planet from the comforts of
their home.
Her company offers a wide variety of
segregation products, ranging from
composters to informational books
and more. Poonam’s goal is to try and
minimize the byproducts of food wastage
that end up in our nation’s landfills, water
bodies, and air. Using her knowledge of
design, Poonam attempts to challenge the
misconceptions associated with at-home
composting, making it a practical and
viable venture.
Making
At-Home
Composting
Fun and
Practical
Daily Dump focuses
on creating easy and
engaging solutions
for sustainable urban
lifestyles through
portable composting
techniques 4647
Transforming India’s
Neonatal Care
Pratyusha Pareddy
NemoCare Wellness, Hyderabad, Telangana
More than 4,00,000 newborns die every year in India.
Although tools exist to combat illnesses to which
newborns are most susceptible, accessibility and
affordability continue to remain an issue. To combat
these preventable deaths, Pratyusha Pareddy
founded her startup, NemoCare, in 2017. NemoCare
aims to combat infant mortality and promote
neonatal care.
Enrolling and undergoing the IIT-Hyderabad
Healthcare Entrepreneurship Fellowship fostered
Pratyusha’s affinity to work in neonatal. Working
with the Government of Gujarat on maternal
healthcare for rural communities further exposed
her to the harsh realities faced by many mothers
and newborns. Pratyusha realized that creating a
monitoring system that would detect preventable
infections and illnesses such as Apnea and
Hypothermia could enable neonatal healthcare
workers to take action promptly. Consequently,
NemoCare has been able to impact over 20,000
babies across India and assist over 300 frontline
health workers.
NemoCare strives to
end all preventable
neonatal and maternal
deaths by building
innovative affordable
and accessible
monitoring solutions for
emerging markets 4849
Dr. Radhike Khanna
OM Creations Trust, Mumbai, Maharashtra
India’s competitive education system sometimes fails
to recognize the different approaches to learning that
are required to make students from all walks of life
blossom academically and socially. This is particularly
true for Dr. Radhike Khanna’s intellectually disabled
students. She founded Om Creations Trust, a non-
profit organization which is dedicated to personalizing
education for intellectually disabled girls and women.
Founded in 1991, the Trust works towards enabling
girls diagnosed with Down Syndrome to lead
relatively independent lives and provide them with
the skills that can help them earn an income. These
activities empower young girls by making them self-
sufficient and financially independent in a controlled
environment. The Trust trains their beneficiaries to
create artwork and foodstuffs for sale. The proceeds
from this are used for the functioning of the NGO and
the development of the girls involved with the Trust.Dr.
Khanna believes that her efforts are not only a form of
therapy but also a source of earning for these children
that require special care.
Empowering
the Specially
Abled to
Live Life with
Dignity and
Independence
Through professional training and support,
OM Creations empowers women with
disabilities to lead a life of dignity 5051
Revolutionizing
India’s Education
Landscape - One
Teacher at
a Time
The United Nations lists attaining a
quality education as its fourth Sustainable
Development Goal. In India, a country with
significant disparity between education
systems, Ramya Venkatraman attempts
to bridge this gap in quality. India suffers
from a shortage of 12 lakh teachers within
the education system. However, this
gap continues to grow as there is little
aspiration to become a teacher due to the
absence of incentives and aid to improve
their skills and capacity.
To solve this issue, the Centre for Teacher
Accreditation (CENTA) was founded
in 2014 by Ramya. The company has
created a certification framework that
allows for teachers’ skills and competency
to be assessed as well as improved.
Through her organisation, Ramya is
helping revamp the education system
and incentivize teachers to better their
qualifications. CENTA’s framework focuses
on three main areas: core competencies,
professional competencies, and technical
competencies. In addressing these three
key areas, CENTA is able to provide
reliable teachers who will educate the next
generation.
Ramya Venkataraman
Centre for Teacher Accreditation (CENTA), Bengaluru, Karnataka
CENTA makes the
noble profession
of teaching more
aspirational by
connecting outstanding
teachers to career
opportunities, rewards
and recognition 5253
Reuse it or
Refuse it: Beating
Plastic Pollution
Rhea Mazumdar Singhal
Ecoware Solutions, Noida Uttar Pradesh
Upon her return to India in 2009, Rhea
Mazumdar Singhal was taken aback by
the sheer amount of crop burning and
plastic waste creation that occurs in India.
With a background in Pharmacology, Rhea
was well aware of the harmful impact
plastic waste can have, not only on the
environment but also on the human body.
As she shopped for her daughter’s birthday
in the search of safe yet disposable
packaging, she was shocked to find that
there were no such options. This incident
encouraged her to try her hand at resolving
the problem of sustainable food packaging
in India.
Founded in 2010, Ecoware is the first
and largest company dedicated to the
production of sustainable packaging. The
organisation has championed the shift to
biodegradable food packaging alternatives
in India. Today, Ecoware works with many
restaurants, encouraging them to realize
the necessity of switching to sustainable
food packaging alternatives. One of the
company’s key milestones has been to
work with the Indian Railways, one of
India’s largest users of food packaging, to
switch to the more sustainable options.
Through their products,
Ecoware Solutions
aims to eliminate
waste, reimagine
resource productivity
and enhance customer
value proposition 5455
Providing
End-to-End
R&D Solutions
to the Food
Industry
Thinking Forks is a consulting
organisation, with expertise in the food
and nutrition industry. The organisation
was founded in 2014 by Rinka Banerjee,
who comes with over 19 years of industry
experience. The consulting organisation
prioritises R&D, which has allowed them
to create products to combat acute
malnutrition; a program aligned with the
Indian Government’s public health efforts.
They have also worked with entities to
develop a commercially viable, ready-to-
transfer technology in the realm of child
nutrition.
Along with its social triumphs, Thinking
Forks has helped develop and launch
many Indian startups in the field of healthy
food products. They wish to work with
small and large businesses and provide
solutions regarding product and packaging
development, establishing feasibility
on pilot and commercial scale, shelf
life, nutrition & health communication,
regulatory compliance & commercial
manufacturing. The company is now
working towards creating products for
those who suffer from diabetes. With the
help of their innovative technologies, they
are also creating meal replacements.
Rinka Banerjee
Thinking Forks Consulting, Bengaluru, Karnataka
Thinking Forks
envisions itself to be a
key enabler of growth
in the food industry
through a creative
blend of design
thinking, consumer
insights and industry
expertise 5657
Increasing Access
to Potable Water
Rituparna Das
Hydrotech Solutions, Kolkata, West Bengal
Based in Kolkata, Rituparna Das’ company Hydrotec Solutions aims
to help those with limited access to clean and affordable drinking
water. The social startup, founded in 2014, has been successful in
implementing its technologies in schools, hospitals, factories and
rural and urban communities across India.
The company provides many forms of water accessibility, ranging
from their AROSIA Water ATMs to industrial pumps and treatment
plants. Rituparna was set on using technology that could solve the
water crisis many rural and urban communities in India face. The IOT
real time monitoring technology allows for the quality of water to be
constantly assessed, ensuring safe drinking water for those who now
have access to it.
Hydrotec Solutions
provides solar
powered and cloud
connected water
dispensing systems
that enable sustainable
water management
techniques 5859
Ruchi Jain
Taru Naturals, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Empowering Small-Scale
Farmers Through Technology
and Fair Trade Markets
With topsoil depletion, groundwater
contamination, continued neglect of the
living, and working conditions for farm
labourers, there has been mounting
economic and environmental concerns
for the agricultural community. This made
Ruchi Jain found Taru Naturals. Quitting
her high paying corporate job, Ruchi has
focused on sustainable agriculture, striving
to empower a network of small-scale
farmers by leveraging upon India’s ancient
wisdom and sustainable agricultural
practices, while ensuring smarter ways of
incomes for the communities Taru engages
with.
Her goal has been to make this community
more resource efficient, by enabling
them to break free from the shackles of
poverty and promote gender equality.
The organisation trains these farmers
in regenerative agriculture techniques,
in addition to providing them with the
small-scale technology needed for their
businesses to flourish. Ruchi has been
able to impact the lives of more than 3,000
farmers across India, helping them connect
with fair trade markets and restaurants to
sell their produce.
Taru Naturals strives to
build self-sufficiency
across the value chain
for farm produce and
envisions to safeguard
sustainable rural
livelihoods & double
small-scale farmer
incomes 6061
Building a Movement of
Leaders to Transform the
Education System
While walking through Mumbai’s slums,
Shaheen Mistri saw the plight of neglected
children in India’s most marginalized and
forgotten communities. With a firm belief
that the lack of education was at the root of
many problems faced by these communities,
Shaheen Mistri focused her efforts on
projects that helped empower the young,
neglected children of India’s slums. She even
chose to relocate her education from Tufts
University to St. Xavier’s College, to be more
actively involved in her efforts to help the
disadvantaged youth.
With her growing concerns regarding India’s
education system, Shaheen could no longer
Shaheen Mistri
Teach for India, Mumbai, Maharashtra
be complacent. She founded Teach for India
in 2008 in an effort to solve the problems
she had identified in India’s education sector.
Teach for India, based on the proven model of
Teach for America, aims to educate children
from the most disadvantaged communities,
to provide them with the means to lift
themselves out of poverty.
Teach for India has made a fundamental
change to the way disadvantaged children
attain education by building a cohort of young
leaders to fuel the movement of overcoming
the inequalities that exist in India’s education
system. Today, Teach for India has nearly
38,000 students and over 1,000 fellows.
Teach for India provides
opportunities for
promising youth to
tackle the grassroot
realities of the Indian
education system 6263
Innovating
Food
Techonolgies
to Empower
Rural
Communities
Bastar Foods, founded by Jagdalpur native
Raziya attempts to bring R&D in food
technologies to the tribal belt of Bastar
and in surrounding areas of Chhattisgarh,
Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana.
Her vision is to implement a strong food
supply chain, raise awareness on nutrition
and promote health through good
quality food.
Raziya through Bastar Foods aims to
combat the many obstacles women in
her community face while attempting to
better their lives. Bastar Foods has set up
factories in rural communities that teach
women about food sciences, allowing
them to learn food production and create
eatables such as laddoos, which they
sell to maintain a steady flow of income.
Bastar Foods has helped empower
and mobilize women in rural areas to
better their knowledge and skills in food
production and has made them financially
independent.
Shaikh Raziya
Bastar Foods, Jagdalpur, Chhattisgarh
Bastar Foods is
bringing growth and
development to the
food industry in south
Chhattisgarh by
upskilling rural women
on best practices in
food tech 6465
Creating Inclusion
Through Greater
Accessiblity
Shilpi Kapoor
BarrierBreak, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Over 26 million Indians are differently-
abled. People with disabilities face an
insurmountable number of barriers in
society, making living independently a
challenge. Her mentor’s disability inspired
Shilpi Kapoor to innovate technology for
the benefit of the disabled population. She
started BarrierBreak, a company focused
on the accessibility of technology for those
with disabilities. The company uses digital
access as a way to bridge some of the
challenges differently-abled people
face daily.
Founded on three principles: technology,
hiring the differently-abled, and a for-profit
model, BarrierBreak creates technologies
that help those who do not have the motor
abilities to partake in physical activities
that can bring knowledge and joy. These
products range from assistive listening
devices, open inclusive libraries, braille
displayers and more.
BarrierBreak dreams of
a society with ease of
access to employment,
education, social life
and independent living
for all through the
support of technology 6667
Shilpa Malik
Bioscan Research, Ahmedabad, Gujarat
Enabling Early
Detection of Diseases
Over a million people in India are injured
due to Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).
Bioscan, founded by Shilpa Malik, provides
services that enable early detection of TBI
caused by various forms of accidents such
as falling, violence, natural calamities, and
road accidents. The Ahmedabad-based
startup has developed an affordable, non-
invasive screening tool for a quick on site
scan that can be effectively used to detect
intracranial haemorrhage in two minutes,
that can be used by a lay person.
One key reason TBI goes untreated is
because patients do not feel the need to
pursue further medical tests when they
experience mild symptoms, which results
in irreversible brain damage. Shilpa’s
company has proven that making products
easily accessible and portable can help
reduce the number of TBI patients that go
unadministered.
Bioscan Research
offers an affordable,
handy and non-
invasive screening
tool that effectively
detects, the often
undiagnosed,
intracranial bleeding 6869
Upskilling Healthcare’s
Frontline Workers
Health workers form the backbone of
India’s public health systems. With the
lack of access to hospitals and doctors,
many rely on their treatments to be
carried out by nurses and frontline health
workers. Noticing this pattern in the Indian
society, Shrutika Girdhar and her partner
founded Bodhi Health Education in 2012.
The organization has set up a platform
dedicated to providing quality training to
health workers, thus improving their skilling
and efficacy. Through this venture, Shrutika
aims to tackle the shortage of skilled
frontline health workers in India.
Using low cost mobile technology allied
with e-learning, Bodhi Health Education has
created a scalable and valuable resource
to assist Indian health workers in their
training. Since its inception, Bodhi Health
Education’s application has been utilized
by more than 45,000 medical students and
medical professionals, and is projected
to impact 100 million Indians in various
regions.
Shrutika Girdhar
Bodhi Health Education, Gurugram, Haryana
Bodhi Health Education
aims to improve
knowledge and skills
of frontline health
professionals in India 7071
Shuchi Pandya
Pipa Bella Accessories, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Shuchi Pandya, a Wharton Business School alumna realized a paradigm shift
in Indian society in terms of decision making when it came to the purchase
of jewellery - an industry previously dominated by men. Upon this realization,
Shuchi created Pipa Bella, a company that aims to create ‘aspirational yet
affordable’ jewellery.
Pipa Bella tries to capture the Indian woman’s identity and sense of style. The
in-house design team often incorporates traditional Indian manufacturing
techniques in the jewellery design and focuses on perfection. Banking heavily
on the use of technology to run her business, Shuchi uses data to predict
market trends that will hit India in the near future and leverages the latest
innovations for her company’s inventory planning. With exquisite quality, the
brand has now amassed a loyal following among its urban audience.
Making Traditional
Jewellery
Aspirational
The Pipa Bella
brand has been
revolutionizing digital
fashion with its range
of classic and bold
accessories for the
modern Indian woman 7273
Making Learning Fun
and Engaging
Sneha Sundaram
Kutuki, Bengaluru, Karnataka
Founded in 2017 by Sneha Sundaram, Kutuki is a company
that focuses on bridging the learning gap that exists in
Indian pre-schools. While exposure to western television
programs are abundant in the homes of young children,
the learning from these are few. Through their mobile
application, Kutuki provides an elaborate curriculum for
preschool students which banks on different forms of
stimuli such as music, colors, and words.
Kutuki has garnered over 50,000 users till date and attempts
to use data to better their understanding of how information
is received by these young children. The application’s
content includes many regional languages of India, thus
being inclusive and accessible to all learners.
Kutuki nurtures the
natural curiosity of
children through
engaging, meaningful
and age appropriate
and content for early
learning 7475
Transforming
Education in
Ladakh
Sujata Sahu
17000 ft Foundation, Gurugram, Haryana
17000 ft Foundation is a social enterprise
focused on providing education and exposure to
the communities in the most rural and isolated
regions of Ladakh. The company was founded
when avid trekker, Sujata Sahu, went on a three
day trek to a remote village in Ladakh. Seeing
eager children wanting to learn even though
the contents of textbooks were alien to them,
inspired her to start 17000 ft Foundation.
17000 ft Foundation aims to reduce the
desperate exodus of indigenous communities
to faraway cities. The organisation works to
educate children and adults in the remote
regions of Ladakh, along with building
infrastructure and creating exposure for the
rest of society. Her foundation has worked with
over 250 communities in Ladakh, mobilising
community members to contribute to their
development efforts.
The program focuses on improving education
in government schools, creating livelihood
opportunities, and generating exposure through
interaction with the outside world. Their work
spans the entire 65,000 sq. km. of Ladakh,
and aims to impact other similarly remove and
inaccessible regions.
By digitizing 120
schools, launching
230 libraries and
setting up 140
playgrounds, 17000ft
attempts to enrich
livelihoods in remote
areas of India and
empower marginalized
communities 7677
WEP TEAM
LEADERSHIP TEAM
Mr. Arnab Kumar
Programme Director,
NITI Aayog
Ms. Anna Roy
Chairperson WEP,
Senior Adviser, NITI Aayog
EXECUTION TEAM
Abhas VyasAnkan De
Sanjana Mohanty Siddhant Sawhney
Deepika Raman
Tanay Mahindru
Garima Agrawal
Yash Mehrotra
Mansha Siraj @NITIAayog
@NITIAayog
@WEP_NITIAayog
@WomenEntrepreneurshipPlatform
In partnership with
ENTREPRENEURS
LEADING CHANGE
TRANSFORMING INDIA 2019 TRANSFORMING INDIA 2019
STORIES OF WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS
LEADING CHANGE
In partnership with
Designed by Creative Inc Dr. Rajiv Kumar
Vice Chairman, NITI Aayog
Mr. Amitabh Kant
CEO, NITI Aayog
ForewordMessage
The International Women’s Day is celebrated on 08 March
every year to reflect on the strides made towards a gender
equal society and calls for action on bridging the remaining
gaps. It is also an occasion to celebrate women doing
extraordinary work. The theme of this year’s International
Women’s Day is “I am Generation Equality: Realizing Women’s
Rights” and is closely aligned with NITI Aayog’s ‘Strategy
for New India @ 75’. NITI Aayog is committed to creating
an enabling environment for women sans institutional and
structural barriers and improving India’s female labour force
participation.
The Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP) is one such
effort to empower women across India to realize their
entrepreneurial aspirations and gain access to resources.
NITI Aayog aims to develop WEP to become a single point
of access to information and services relevant to women
entrepreneurs at different stages of their journeys. The
platform achieves this by working closely with its partner
organizations to develop customized information resources,
capacity building programmes and linkages to services that
are relevant to women entrepreneurs.
While the lack of access to resources and mentorship is
being actively addressed through WEP’s multivariate service
offerings, the need to create more role models for women
to look up to and be inspired has also been identified. The
Women Transforming India (WTI) Awards addresses this
The shift of a large proportion of India’s population from
job seekers to risk takers and employment generators
through startups has propelled India on a path of economic
boom and growth. Startups have emerged as engines of
growth for our economy. Over the last five years, India has
seen the emergence of over 60,000 new enterprises which
are contributing to the nation’s growth and development.
The last two decades have witnessed the Indian society
become progressively inclusive, with active efforts to bridge
gender based inequalities. Despite this progress, women
only constitute around 14% of the total entrepreneurs in the
country.
The country’s economic growth has much to gain if women,
who constitute 48% of the population, can exercise their
agency beyond the domestic realm. However, women
continue to be inhibited from entering the formal workforce
due to deeply entrenched socio-cultural expectations
and inadequate access to relevant knowledge and skills.
Entrepreneurship provides the latitude for women to earn their
livelihood on their own terms and gain financial independence
in the process.
Cognizance of the scope of entrepreneurship to stimulate
socio-economic development has led to a pan India adoption
of policies and programs targeted at building a catalytic
environment for entrepreneurs. I ardently believe that only a
nation that encourages the full and unhindered participation
need by recognizing exceptional women from both commercial
and social sectors. Since 2018, the WTI Awards have been
hosted under the ambit of WEP and have had a special focus on
entrepreneurship.
These Awards are NITI Aayog’s initiative to highlight the
commendable and ground breaking endeavours of India’s most
innovative and hard working entrepreneurs. I am pleased by the
enthusiastic response and am highly impressed by the quality
of the applicants this year. I congratulate the Top 30 for making
it through a comprehensive evaluation process and wish them
the best of luck for their journey ahead.
We at NITI Aayog hope to keep providing more support as
WEP grows and look forward to supporting more women
entrepreneurs who would like to contribute to nation building.
I would also complement the NITI Aayog team lead by Anna
Roy in making WEP and WTI Awards such great success. I wish
them all the best. Jai Hind!
of women in economic and political life can reach its potential
to transform society. For India to channel a positive disruption
to her startup ecosystem, it is imperative to create an enabling
environment for women entrepreneurs.
Since its announcement over two years ago at the Global
Entrepreneurship Summit, the ‘Women Entrepreneurship
Platform’ has become a forum dedicated to educating, enabling
and empowering women entrepreneurs. The platform has
become a one stop solution for women to access information
relating to funding, incubation, capacity building and
compliance. WEP has also created a community of women
entrepreneurs, which serves as a support system to enable
mentorship, peer learning and improved access to information.
Under the umbrella of the WEP, the Women Transforming India
Awards is an initiative to celebrate India’s female pioneers. The
changemakers that the Awards recognize are challenging social
expectations to break the glass ceiling and drive India towards a
gender equal society.
The thirty women featured in this book are trailblazers in
their own right and are representative of India’s exceptional
entrepreneurial ambitions and capabilities. I look forward to
WEP’s successful engagement with these women leaders as
we continue to support them in their endeavours. I wish Anna
Roy and her team at NITI Aayog the very best for all future
endeavours of WEP. Introduction to WTI
Awards
Launched in 2016, the Women Transforming India
(WTI) Awards mark NITI Aayog’s annual endeavour to
recognize exceptional women changemakers in the
country. The Fourth Edition of the WTI Awards hosted
under the Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP),
was announced in August 2019 and built on last year’s
theme of ‘Women and Entrepreneurship’. At the time of
closing of the applications for the Awards in November
2019, NITI Aayog had received an overwhelming
response from across the country. The applicant pool
was as competitive and impressive as it was diverse
and inspiring.
The selection of the top women entrepreneurs was
an elaborate task that saw the coming together of
WEP’s community of partners and mentors. For the
first round of evaluations, the WEP team undertook
a rigorous appraisal of all applications to shortlist
this year’s Top 130 women entrepreneurs with the
assistance of PwC - our evaluation partners.
In the second round, the Top 130 were invited to
present their journeys to a panel of WEP’s Jury
members on 06 December, 2019. The Jury comprised
of thought leaders and industry experts across
various fields who evaluated the presentations
of the shortlisted 130. After a day of meticulous
assessments, the Jury whittled the list down to the Top
30 women entrepreneurs from the applicants.
This cohort of WTI’s Top 30 women constitutes an
impressive array of trail blazers who have led strong
business models or made groundbreaking innovations,
shattering the glass ceilings to achieve success. The
selection of the 15 winners called for a final day of
deliberations on the impact created by these women’s
remarkable initiatives as well as their personal stories
and struggles. In the last stage of evaluation, these
30 entrepreneurs were invited to NITI Aayog on 15
December, 2019, where a Super Jury comprised of
industry leaders were called upon to determine the
winners for this edition of the WTI Awards.
The Super Jury round was followed by a pitching
session wherein the Top 30 had a chance to present
before social impact investors, angel investors as
well as venture capitalists for funding. The exercise
sought to harness the insights of the investors
to provide funding guidance and support through
subsequently planned sessions that will connect
women entrepreneurs with potential investors.
Over the course of the last several months, the WEP
team has worked to ensure that the WTI Awards
recognize these incredible women, their perseverance,
tenacity and hard work which have helped them
emerge as winners in their own right.
It is important to note that this journey would not have
been possible without the support of our partners
who were ever so forthcoming with their assistance
and guidance. We would like to thank you all for your
constant support to the WEP family and look forward
to collaborating on our efforts to inform, enable and
empower the women entrepreneurs of this country.
Message
Ms. Anna Roy
Chairperson WEP,
Senior Adviser, NITI Aayog
Realizing India’s dream of becoming a five trillion dollar
economy is possible only with the active participation
of her female workforce. Women entrepreneurs are
revolutionizing the country by taking the lead in fields
that have traditionally been dominated by men. While
women have increasingly become more active in the
entrepreneurial landscape, the success of women
entrepreneurs is often inhibited by socio-cultural norms.
The information asymmetry amplifies the issue of
access to requisite knowledge and services. It thus
becomes critical to not only encourage women in their
entrepreneurial journey, but to also support them in
overcoming systemic barriers and contextual challenges.
Launched on the International Women’s Day in 2018,
the Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP) has been
envisioned as a novel unified access portal for women
entrepreneurs. WEP strives to improve industry linkages
and awareness of existing programs and services and
provide access to peer support, learning resources, funding
and mentorship.
In the span of just two years, WEP has observed
several success stories. The platform has more than
14,000 registered women entrepreneurs and more than
30 partners supporting capacity building, providing
compliance, taxation, mentorship and funding support.
WEP has been recognising the achievements of India’s
leading women changemakers through NITI Aayog’s
flagship initiative - the Women Transforming India (WTI)
Awards. Since 2016 the awards have been celebrating
stories of exemplary women leaders from across India who
are breaking the glass ceiling.
The Fourth Edition of the Awards, launched in August 2019,
focused on the theme “Women and Entrepreneurship” and
received more than 2,300 entries. Through a rigorous three
stage independent process, we have identified the top 30
finalists, all of whom have been path breakers in their own
right. Leading industry leaders have helped NITI Aayog in
selecting this cohort of WTI winners.
This coffee table book is an effort to showcase the
heartening stories of grit, determination, hard work and
success of the women who are leading a new wave of
change. Radhika Kaul Batra
Chief of Staff, UN Resident
Coordinator’s Office
C. P. Gurnani
CEO and Manging Director,
Tech Mahindra
Anjali Bansal
Founder, Avaana Capital
Amit Chandra
Chairman and Managing
Director, Bain Capital
Super Jury
Members
Namita Thapar
Executive Director Emcure
Pharmaceuticals and CEO- YEA!
(Young Entrepreneurs Academy India)
Chetna Gala Sinha
Founder / Chair, Mann Deshi
Bank & Mann Deshi Foundation
Debjani Ghosh
President, NASSCOM
Mira Kulkarni
Chairman and Managing
Director, Forest Essentials
Ronnie Screwvala
Co-founder and Chairman,
upGrad
Shobana Kamineni
Executive Vice-Chairperson,
Apollo Hospitals Enterprise
Limited
Lakshmi Puri
Former Assistant Secretary-
General, United Nations
Renata Dessallien
United Nations Resident
Coordinator in India
Anand Sherkhane
Additional Development
Commissioner, Ministry of Micro,
Small and Medium Enterprises
Roopa Kudva
Managing Director, Omidyar
Network India Mukund Khadgi
Assistant General Manager,
Bank of Baroda
Raman Sidhu
Co-founder and President,
PAFI
Raghavendra Singh
Joint President, Head –
Group Public Affairs, Kotak
Mahindra Bank Limited
Nakul Saxena
Director – Public Policy,
iSPIRT Foundation
Nath Parmeshwar
Director, PayPal india
Nandita Mishra
Economic Adviser, Ministry
of Corporate Affairs,
Govt. of India
Mudit Narain
Programme Director,
Atal Innovation Mission,
NITI Aayog
Mukesh Mohan Gupta
President, Chamber of
Indian Micro Small & Medium
Enterprises
Anasuya Gupta
Chairperson and
Managing Director, CICO
Technologies Ltd.
Ajay Khanna
Chief Strategic & Public Affairs,
Group Ombudsperson, Jubilant
Bhartia Group
Jury
Members
Deepti Ravula
CEO, WE Hub
Anirban Gupta
Co-founder, Dhriiti - The
Courage Within
Anjana Menon
CEO, Content Pixies
Ashish Desai
CEO, Jumo India
Asomee Dutta Baruah
Chief Functionary &
Secretary General,
Sreemanta Sankar Mission
of Guwahati
Gurinder Singh Malik
Distinguished Scientist &
DG(R&D) (DRDO) (Retd) &
Advisor, MHRD
Kanneganti Rama Devi
President, Association of
Lady Entrepreneurs of India
Raman Uberoi
Senior Advisor, CRISIL
Limited
Saachi Bhalla
Program Officer, Policy &
Strategic Partnerships, BMGF
Shivani Malik
Director - Marketing,
Da Milano
Shriya Sethi
Director, International
Innovation Corps,
UChicago Trust
Jyotsna Sitling, IFoS
Principal Chief Conservator of
Forests, Govt. of Uttarakhand
Sneha Jain
Founder & Trustee,
Daanish India Foundation
Jagdish Mitra
Chief Strategy Officer
and Head of Growth, Tech
Mahindra
Urvashi Khemka
Vice Chairman - The Global
Education & Leadership
Foundation (tGELF)
Usha Sangwan
Board Member, Bombay
Stock Exchange
Yatin K Thakur
Chairman, GEN India
Upasna Dash
CEO & Founder, Jajabor
Brand Consultancy
Swarandeep Singh
Kambo
Lead - Investments and
Community, UNLEASH
Shwetank Verma
Co-founder and General
Partner, Leo Capital
Sangeeta Gupta
Senior VP, NASSCOM
CA Kawaljit Singh Oberoi
Proprietor, K.S. Oberoi & Co.,
Chartered Accountants,
New Delhi
Sayantani Mukherjee
Women’s Entrepreneurship
& Financial Inclusion
Associate, UNDP
Gayatree Anand
Chief Minister’s Urban
Leaders Fellow, Delhi
Government
Julia Karst
Project head, Project
Her&Now, GIZ Contents
Ensuring Quality and
Improving Performance
DR. ANUPRIYA BALIKAI
SPOOKFISH INNOVATION
20
Creating Inclusive
Playgrounds for Children
with Disabilities
ADITI AGARWAL
GUDGUDEE
16
Providing Clean Drinking
Water Through Cost-
Effective Technologies
DR. SUPHIYA KHAN
DRUMLINS WATER
TECHNOLOGY
28
Educate, Enable, Empower:
Building a Better Future for
India’s Women
DR. ARMIDA
FERNANDEZ
SNEHA
22
Destigmatizing Menstrual
Health and Hygiene
ADITI GUPTA
MENSTRUPEDIA
18
Hybrid Cooling Systems, Paving
the Way Towards a Sustainable
Future
DR. PRIYANKA
MOKSHMAR, VAAYU
HOME APPLIANCES
26
Eliminating Poverty:
Hand in Hand
DR. KALPANA SANKAR
HAND IN HAND
24
Transforming Education in
Ladakh
SUJATA SAHU
17000 FT FOUNDATION
74
Innovating Food Techonolgies
to Empower Rural Communities
SHAIKH RAZIYA
BASTAR FOODS
62
Making Learning Fun and
Engaging
SNEHA SUNDARAM
KUTUKI
72
Creating Inclusion Through
Greater Accessiblity
SHILPI KAPOOR
BARRIERBREAK
64
Technology that Ensures
Safe Drinking Water
SHILPA MALIK
BIOSCAN RESEARCH
66
Upskilling Healthcare’s
Frontline Workers
SHRUTIKA GIRDHAR
BODHI HEALTH
EDUCATION
68
Making Traditional Jewellery
Aspirational
SHUCHI PANDYA
PIPA BELLA
ACCESSORIES
70
Empowering Farmers Through
Mushroom Farming
JAYANTI PRADHAN
GOPAL BIOTECH AGRO FARM
30
Saving Lives Through
Crowdfunding
KHUSHBOO JAIN
IMPACT GURU
34
India’s First Commercial
Tissue Bank
DR. JUGNU JAIN
SAPIEN BIOSCIENCES
32
Protecting Farmer Livelihoods
and Reducing Crop Wastage
NIDHI PANT
S4S TECHNOLOGIES
42
Making Hostel Life Secure
MADHAVI SHANKAR
SPACEBASIC INC
36
Plastic Waste — Fueling
a Better Tomorrow
DR. MEDHA TADPATRIKAR
RUDRA, ENVIRONMENTAL
SOLUTION INDIA
38
Providing Internet
for All
DR. NEHA SATAK
ASTROME
TECHNOLOGIES
40
Making At-Home Composting
Fun and Practical
POONAM BIR KASTURI
DAILY DUMP
44
Empowering Small-Scale
Farmers Through Technology
and Fair Trade Markets
RUCHI JAIN
TARU NATURALS
58
Increasing Access to Potable
Water
RITUPARNA DAS
HYDROTECH SOLUTIONS
56
Building a Movement of
Leaders to Transform the
Education System
SHAHEEN MISTRI,
TEACH FOR INDIA
60
Empowering the Specially
Abled to Live Life with
Dignity and Independence
DR. RADHIKE KHANNA
OM CREATIONS TRUST
48
Providing End-to-End R&D
Solutions to the Food Industry
RINKA BANERJEE, THINKING
FORKS CONSULTING
54
Transforming India’s
Neonatal Care
PRATYUSHA PAREDDY
NEMOCARE WELLNESS
46
Revolutionizing India’s
Education Landscape - One
Teacher at a Time
RAMYA VENKATARAMAN
CENTRE FOR TEACHER
ACCREDITATION (CENTA)
50
Reuse it or Refuse it…Beat
Plastic Pollution
RHEA MAZUMDAR
SINGHAL, ECOWARE
SOLUTIONS
52 WOMEN
TRANSFORMING
INDIA 2019
STORIES OF WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS
LEADING CHANGE 1617
While taking a college course on Design for
Special Needs, Aditi Agarwal realised the
lack of outdoor play options for children with
special needs during their formative years.
At Gudgudee, Aditi attempts to reinvent the
concept of a playground, allowing for it to
be accessible and enjoyable for children
with disabilities. Focusing on the needs and
challenges of these children, Aditi and her
co-founder Anjali Menon create a playground
that integrates the magic of sound, smell,
touch and visuals to create exciting
experiences for kids with special needs.
Aditi Agarwal
Gudgudee, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Creating
Inclusive
Playgrounds
for Children
with
Disabilities
Gudgudee also offers customised design
services and has been creating an
ecosystem around design for play and
recently organized the International Play
Conference. Since its inception, the company
has been able to build 40 playgrounds in 16
cities across India. Aditi has also brought to
light the stigma around physical disabilities,
attempting to destigmatize the issue and
empower millions of Indian children who
have such disabilities.
Gudgudee works with
occupational therapists,
child physiologists and
teachers to design
play areas that suit the
developmental needs of
the children with special
needs 1819
Destigmatizing
Menstrual Health and
Hygiene
Aditi Gupta
Menstrupedia, Ahmedabad, Gujarat
Growing up in a middle-class conservative
family, Aditi Gupta, like many girls in India,
was no stranger to the stigma around
menstruation and menstrual hygiene. Due to
the taboo on menstruation, Aditi would resort
to using cloth in place of sanitary napkins, as
it was a shame for the family to speak of their
menstruating daughter and unthinkable for
them to purchase the required goods.
Such experiences and the accompanying
frustrations, coupled with her growing
knowledge of menstrual care and hygiene,
empowered Aditi to found Menstrupedia.
Through this initiative, Aditi works diligently
to educate and destigmatize menstrual health
and hygiene amongst the communities in
India. Menstrupedia creates comic books
in eight different Indian languages, as well
as foreign languages, on menstrual health
information. The comics have been well
received across the board and have registered
well with young girls, parents, and teachers.
She has received a lot of recognition and
acclaim with patrons of her cause even
contributing funds. The support and praise
garnered by Menstrupedia underlines the
impact that such an initiative can have on the
Indian society where such topics are usually
swept under the rug.
Menstrupedia is a small
but definitive step to
shatter the myths and
misconceptions around
menstruation 2021
Ensuring
Quality and
Improving
Performance
India is a fast growing consumer economy. With
increased consumption of goods, society becomes
more wary of product and packaging standards.
Spookfish attempts to be transparent with
consumers and reassures them about the quality
of product packaging across India. The company
conducts quality inspections predominantly in the
food & beverage and pharmaceutical industries.
Through this venture, Dr. Anupriya Balikai, the
Managing Director of Spookfish Innovations,
attempts to create a standard for products and to
ensure quality control for food packaging.
Spookfish Innovations focuses on manufacturing
inspection machines that are retrofitted and
integrated into existing manufacturing lines - with
the ability to inspect over 240 bottles per minute
and 15,000 tablets per minute. Applying the latest
computer vision technology and machine learning
techniques, they deploy cutting edge, intelligent
solutions, ensuring that their clients are a step
ahead of competition.
Dr. Anupriya Balikai
Spookfish Innovation, Bengaluru, Karnataka
Spookfish Innovations envisions using
cutting edge, intelligent solutions to change
the face of industrial automation 2223
Educate, Enable,
Empower: Building
a Better Future for
India’s Women
Dr Armida Fernandez
SNEHA, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Dr. Armida Fernandez’s experience as a
medical professional exposed her to the
health risks that mothers and babies face
at birth and immediately after. With her
knowledge of neonatal and maternal care,
Dr. Fernandez set up Asia’s first milk bank
at Sion Hospital in 1989. After learning of
an incident involving a six-year old child’s
rape, she felt the need to empower women
by providing them with information and
outlets that could protect them. In the 1990s,
Dr. Fernandez went on to create SNEHA, an
entity dedicated to educating women on the
problems they face domestically, as well as
empowering them to appropriately deal with
such situations.
The objectives of SNEHA are to change
the mindsets and practices in maternal
and adolescent health, and to educate the
Indian society on maternal care. Through the
initiatives of SNEHA, Dr. Fernandez attempts
to improve maternal health awareness and
health-seeking behaviors.
SNEHA shares the
twin goals of improving
health-seeking behaviour
among underserved
communities and
enhancing the quality of
public healthcare 2425
Dr. Kalpana Sankar
Hand in Hand, Chennai, Tamil Nadu
Holding a double doctorate in Nuclear
Physics and Gender Issues, Dr. Kalpana
Sankar has been actively involved in the
realm of female empowerment for over
two decades. Dr. Sankar helped establish
Hand in Hand, an organisation dedicated
to empowering the most marginalised
and impoverished women in India through
capacity building and training. Dr. Sankar
has been able to mobilize and empower
women across geographies ranging from
India, Afghanistan, Cambodia to Brazil and
South Africa.
Hand in Hand has provided disadvantaged
women with the opportunity to gain
financial, functional, and digital literacy
training. In addition to the trainings, Dr.
Sankar works with the Government of India
to bridge gaps between women in rural
India and access to government schemes
that can help them overcome poverty. Her
dedication has helped alleviate women
from poverty as well as create jobs.
Eliminating Poverty:
Hand in Hand
Hand In Hand works
to educate and
upskill rural women
to fight poverty and
gender inequality 2627
Hybrid Cooling
Systems,
Paving the
Way Towards
a Sustainable
Future
Dr. Priyanka Mokshmar is the co-founder
of Vaayu Home Appliances. The company
provides a cheap and environmentally
viable alternative to home cooling
systems. Vaayu has created and patented
the technology of their hybrid AC-cum-
cooler unit. While running a home-based
business, Priyanka and her husband
ended up paying high electricity bills and
identified that this was primarily due to the
use of the AC.
Through many years of trial and error and
even selling her home to fund their dream
of creating Vaayu Home Appliances,
the company began operations in 2014.
Still, Dr. Mokshmar continued to face
tribulations throughout her journey.
Whether it was her pursuit to attain funding
for Vaayu, or being taken seriously as a
woman, she faced several challenges
every day but soldiered on. Leveraging her
expertise in marketing and management
she was able to receive Rs. 1 Crore in
funding, under the collateral-free GCTMSE
scheme from the state government of
Madhya Pradesh.
Today, Vaayu Home Appliances
provides economically affordable and
environmentally feasible alternatives to
traditional AC units across India - selling
their products from Madhya Pradesh to
Maharashtra and Delhi.
Dr. Priyanka Mokshmar
Vaayu Home Appliances, Indore, Madhya Pradesh
Vaayu India uses
technology to provide
novel home cooling
solutions that are
affordable and
environment friendly 2829
Dr. Suphiya Khan
Drumlins Water Technology, Jaipur, Rajasthan
Providing Clean Drinking
Water Through Cost-
Effective Technologies
Although the field of biotechnology is
infamously known as a hard industry for
businesses to flourish, it did not stop Dr.
Suphiya Khan from founding Drumlins
Water Technology. As a professor of
biotechnology, she worked in areas of DNA
fingerprinting, chemoprofiling, development
of nano-adsorbents and Fluoride (F)
phytoremediation technology.
Her startup focuses on water purification
as well as water distribution among
communities in India. Fluoride is a
major contributor to the world climate
crisis, affecting over 200 million people
worldwide. Existing methods to deal with
fluoride in water are either too nascent
in their testing or too expensive to be
implemented in developing countries.
Not only has her company helped its
beneficiaries access clean drinking water,
it has also helped develop cost-effective
defluoridation technology for both rural and
urban communities in India.
Drumlins focuses
on developing cost-
effective, portable,
environment & user-
friendly techniques
to reduce the serious
public health risks
posed by Flouride
contaminants 3031
Jayanti Pradhan
Gopal Biotech Agro Farm, Bargarh, Orissa
The cultivation of paddy mushrooms has been a lucrative
arena for landless farmers to earn a steady livelihood.
Jayanti Pradhan, an agro-processor and farmer from
Odisha wanted to challenge the regressive stereotype of
farmers being uneducated.
Education was always important in Jayanti’s
household - her father also a farmer, studied
economics in college, however had failed to
complete his education. But he ensured that Jayanti
finished her education. Jayanti went on to study
botany, which aided her knowledge and skills in
farming. With her deepened knowledge, Jayanti was
able to scale her family’s farming business through
breeding mushrooms. Her successful practices were
then shared with other farmers in her community,
leading to this form of crop harvesting becoming
their main source of earnings.
Jayanti acknowledges the struggles rural female
farmers face, as she too has experienced
discrimination. To combat such mindsets, Jayanti
is focused on educating women in her community
and equipping them with the tools and knowledge
of mushroom farming to enable them to become
financially independent.
Empowering
Farmers
Through
Mushroom
Farming
By sharing best
practices on
mushroom farming and
bee keeping, Gopal
Biotech Agro Farms
has helped establish
120 self-help groups
for women, paving the
way for their financial
independence 3233
India’s First
Commercial
Tissue Bank
In recent years Indian startups have been
able to better India’s healthcare systems
by leaps and bounds. However, the one
key area that had remained untouched
until recently was tissue-banks. Dr.
Jugnu Jain, founder and CSO, of Sapien
Biosciences has addressed this need for
tissue-banks in India. Her previous career in
pharmaceuticals allowed her to realize the
great demand for bio-banks that exist in the
Indian market. As India’s first central bio-
bank, Sapien Biosciences has been able to
collect and use medical waste for research
and development of new diagnostics,
drugs, and reagents.
The pioneering tissue-bank has also
been successful in using medical waste
to create medical innovations. Although
Dr. Jain has faced several challenges
in leading the first tissue-bank in India,
she continues to persevere, conducting
biosample curation and R&D services
that are contributing to path breaking
discoveries in the pharmaceutical industry.
Dr. Jugnu Jain
Sapien Biosciences, Hyderabad, Telangana
Sapien Biosciences
aims to develop a high
quality bio-repository,
by employing human
translational platforms,
to pave the way for
new age healthcare
solutions 3435
Saving Lives Through
Crowdfunding
Khushboo Jain
Impact Guru, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Access to medical treatment in India
is improving with time. However,
patients’ ability to pay for treatments
has remained a pressing problem that
was not tackled until Khushboo Jain
created ImpactGuru. Her organization
is a crowdfunding platform that
empowers individuals, non-governmental
organisations (NGOs), and social
enterprises, by helping them raise funds
for healthcare, social, and personal
needs, from family, friends as well as
strangers. ImpactGuru attempts to
provide crowdfunding opportunities to
those who live below the poverty line,
as well as middle class patients who
have exhausted their financial resources
due to out-of-pocket expenditure on the
treatment of their illnesses.
ImpactGuru’s platform enables
crowdfunding to take place entirely
online. People in need of funds draft a
story and upload pictures/videos via
this novel AI-supported story builder for
medical fundraisers. Started in 2014,
ImpactGuru is now one of India’s largest
crowdfunding entities, contributing
to inspiring social change. It aims to
impact 1 million patient lives in the
upcoming 5 years and foresees getting
the attention of over 15 million donors.
ImpactGuru helps
individuals, NGOs
and social enterprises
to raise funds for
healthcare, social
and personal needs
through crowdfunding 3637
Making Hostel Life
Secure
SpaceBasic is a company focused on
tackling the administrative processes college
students face, such as permission slips, data
management etc. All these processes are very
labour intensive and time consuming.
To solve this problem, SpaceBasic leveraged
technology to digitise these processes.
Madhavi Shankar, the Co-founder and CEO of
the company helped develop an application
that houses all the needed information
and clubs all processes that take place
in a college campus. The company
ensures safety checks and allows for
communication channels, keeping all
features accessible to students, faculty and
parents. SpaceBasics now provides their
services to over 60 institutions and 1.2 lakh
users across India.
Madhavi Shankar
SpaceBasic Inc, Bengaluru, Karnataka
The SpaceBasic
platform enables
transparent ways to
connect, collaborate
and execute day-to-day
tasks within student
housing communities 3839
Plastic Waste — Fueling a
Better Tomorrow
Dr. Medha Tadpatrikar
Rudra Environmental Solution India
Pune, Maharashtra
India produces roughly 26,000 tonnes
of plastic waste daily. Knowing the
consequences that non-recycled plastics
can have on human beings, Dr. Medha
Tadpatrikar decided to utilize plastic in its
entirety. By reversing the process through
which plastic is acquired, Dr. Tadpatrikar
was able to create poly-fuel. After much
trial and error, and testing many iterations
of her procedure in her own kitchen, Dr.
Tadpatrikar successfully created fuel
from plastic through the Thermo Catalytic
Depolarization process.
Not only has Dr. Tadpatrikar tackled the
issue of plastic waste disposal, she has
also provided people in Pune’s villages
with an alternative fuel source. Across
the villages of Pune, she discovered that
households were unable to buy kerosene
due to its unaffordability. She decided to
solve this problem by selling her poly-fuel
at a much cheaper price. Through her
company, Rudra Environmental Solution
India, Dr. Tadpatrikar has been able to
collect 7,50,000 kg of plastic waste till
date.
Rudra believes
technology and
innovation are the key
to solving the biggest
social, environmental
and economic
challenges that India
and the world face 4041
Dr. Neha Satak
Astrome Technologies, Bengaluru, Karnataka
As a young nation, India’s growing
population seeks access to internet and
broadband services. However, advances
in this field still exclude a significant
section of the population - the rural
communities. Dr. Neha Satak, who holds
a PhD from Texas A&M University in
Aerospace Engineering, attempts to
solve this problem through her company,
Astrome. Astrome has created a new
concept of providing internet to those in
rural communities through launching a
constellation of 198 satellites into the Low
Earth Orbit (LEO).
Her patented millimeter wave technology
is said to be revolutionary, and is set
to provide lightning speed broadband
internet of 50 to 400 Mbps even in Tier 2
and Tier 3 cities. With a sound focus on
core technology apart from innovative
business solutions, this disruptive
solution has the potential to transform
more than 4 billion lives across
the globe.
Providing Internet
for All
Astrome endeavours
to provide broadband
internet service to the
most remote locations
in India with their
patented millimeter
wave technology 4243
Protecting Farmer
Livelihoods and Reducing
Crop Wastage
Nidhi Pant
S4S Technologies, Mumbai, Maharashtra
The perishable nature of crops impacts farmers
enormously. They often sell their products for
cheaper prices later in the day as a relatively
large portion of what they produce rots and
turns to waste. To combat this issue around
waste and farmer living standards, Nidhi Pant,
who leads the Science for Society team, has
helped create measures to minimise crop
waste and improve farmers’ livelihoods. Their
innovative idea of selling dehydrated vegetable
snacks is being consumed by more than 10 lakh
people across India.
Farmer suicide is a growing problem in Indian
society and the distress associated with
owning land and creating a steady flow of
income is evident. S4S Technologies provides
the relevant technology to farmers to preserve
their crops through dehydration, creating an
alternate stream of income and protecting their
livelihoods.
S4S Technologies’
solar conduction dryers
increase vegetable shelf
life to six months and
enable rural women
micro-entrepreneurs to
enhance the quality of
farm produce 4445
Poonam Bir Kasturi
Daily Dump, Bengaluru, Karnataka
Founded by Poonam Bir Kasturi in 2006,
the Daily Dump focuses on building
products and services for decentralised
waste management in homes, community
offices and public spaces. Where many did
not see composting as a mode of waste
management, Poonam firmly believed in its
merit. This designer from National Institute
of Design (NID) has brought together
design thinking, traditional pottery and the
science of composting to lessen the load
on public agencies dealing with garbage.
Daily Dump also provides its urban
audience a fun, simple and innovative way
to save the planet from the comforts of
their home.
Her company offers a wide variety of
segregation products, ranging from
composters to informational books
and more. Poonam’s goal is to try and
minimize the byproducts of food wastage
that end up in our nation’s landfills, water
bodies, and air. Using her knowledge of
design, Poonam attempts to challenge the
misconceptions associated with at-home
composting, making it a practical and
viable venture.
Making
At-Home
Composting
Fun and
Practical
Daily Dump focuses
on creating easy and
engaging solutions
for sustainable urban
lifestyles through
portable composting
techniques 4647
Transforming India’s
Neonatal Care
Pratyusha Pareddy
NemoCare Wellness, Hyderabad, Telangana
More than 4,00,000 newborns die every year in India.
Although tools exist to combat illnesses to which
newborns are most susceptible, accessibility and
affordability continue to remain an issue. To combat
these preventable deaths, Pratyusha Pareddy
founded her startup, NemoCare, in 2017. NemoCare
aims to combat infant mortality and promote
neonatal care.
Enrolling and undergoing the IIT-Hyderabad
Healthcare Entrepreneurship Fellowship fostered
Pratyusha’s affinity to work in neonatal. Working
with the Government of Gujarat on maternal
healthcare for rural communities further exposed
her to the harsh realities faced by many mothers
and newborns. Pratyusha realized that creating a
monitoring system that would detect preventable
infections and illnesses such as Apnea and
Hypothermia could enable neonatal healthcare
workers to take action promptly. Consequently,
NemoCare has been able to impact over 20,000
babies across India and assist over 300 frontline
health workers.
NemoCare strives to
end all preventable
neonatal and maternal
deaths by building
innovative affordable
and accessible
monitoring solutions for
emerging markets 4849
Dr. Radhike Khanna
OM Creations Trust, Mumbai, Maharashtra
India’s competitive education system sometimes fails
to recognize the different approaches to learning that
are required to make students from all walks of life
blossom academically and socially. This is particularly
true for Dr. Radhike Khanna’s intellectually disabled
students. She founded Om Creations Trust, a non-
profit organization which is dedicated to personalizing
education for intellectually disabled girls and women.
Founded in 1991, the Trust works towards enabling
girls diagnosed with Down Syndrome to lead
relatively independent lives and provide them with
the skills that can help them earn an income. These
activities empower young girls by making them self-
sufficient and financially independent in a controlled
environment. The Trust trains their beneficiaries to
create artwork and foodstuffs for sale. The proceeds
from this are used for the functioning of the NGO and
the development of the girls involved with the Trust.Dr.
Khanna believes that her efforts are not only a form of
therapy but also a source of earning for these children
that require special care.
Empowering
the Specially
Abled to
Live Life with
Dignity and
Independence
Through professional training and support,
OM Creations empowers women with
disabilities to lead a life of dignity 5051
Revolutionizing
India’s Education
Landscape - One
Teacher at
a Time
The United Nations lists attaining a
quality education as its fourth Sustainable
Development Goal. In India, a country with
significant disparity between education
systems, Ramya Venkatraman attempts
to bridge this gap in quality. India suffers
from a shortage of 12 lakh teachers within
the education system. However, this
gap continues to grow as there is little
aspiration to become a teacher due to the
absence of incentives and aid to improve
their skills and capacity.
To solve this issue, the Centre for Teacher
Accreditation (CENTA) was founded
in 2014 by Ramya. The company has
created a certification framework that
allows for teachers’ skills and competency
to be assessed as well as improved.
Through her organisation, Ramya is
helping revamp the education system
and incentivize teachers to better their
qualifications. CENTA’s framework focuses
on three main areas: core competencies,
professional competencies, and technical
competencies. In addressing these three
key areas, CENTA is able to provide
reliable teachers who will educate the next
generation.
Ramya Venkataraman
Centre for Teacher Accreditation (CENTA), Bengaluru, Karnataka
CENTA makes the
noble profession
of teaching more
aspirational by
connecting outstanding
teachers to career
opportunities, rewards
and recognition 5253
Reuse it or
Refuse it: Beating
Plastic Pollution
Rhea Mazumdar Singhal
Ecoware Solutions, Noida Uttar Pradesh
Upon her return to India in 2009, Rhea
Mazumdar Singhal was taken aback by
the sheer amount of crop burning and
plastic waste creation that occurs in India.
With a background in Pharmacology, Rhea
was well aware of the harmful impact
plastic waste can have, not only on the
environment but also on the human body.
As she shopped for her daughter’s birthday
in the search of safe yet disposable
packaging, she was shocked to find that
there were no such options. This incident
encouraged her to try her hand at resolving
the problem of sustainable food packaging
in India.
Founded in 2010, Ecoware is the first
and largest company dedicated to the
production of sustainable packaging. The
organisation has championed the shift to
biodegradable food packaging alternatives
in India. Today, Ecoware works with many
restaurants, encouraging them to realize
the necessity of switching to sustainable
food packaging alternatives. One of the
company’s key milestones has been to
work with the Indian Railways, one of
India’s largest users of food packaging, to
switch to the more sustainable options.
Through their products,
Ecoware Solutions
aims to eliminate
waste, reimagine
resource productivity
and enhance customer
value proposition 5455
Providing
End-to-End
R&D Solutions
to the Food
Industry
Thinking Forks is a consulting
organisation, with expertise in the food
and nutrition industry. The organisation
was founded in 2014 by Rinka Banerjee,
who comes with over 19 years of industry
experience. The consulting organisation
prioritises R&D, which has allowed them
to create products to combat acute
malnutrition; a program aligned with the
Indian Government’s public health efforts.
They have also worked with entities to
develop a commercially viable, ready-to-
transfer technology in the realm of child
nutrition.
Along with its social triumphs, Thinking
Forks has helped develop and launch
many Indian startups in the field of healthy
food products. They wish to work with
small and large businesses and provide
solutions regarding product and packaging
development, establishing feasibility
on pilot and commercial scale, shelf
life, nutrition & health communication,
regulatory compliance & commercial
manufacturing. The company is now
working towards creating products for
those who suffer from diabetes. With the
help of their innovative technologies, they
are also creating meal replacements.
Rinka Banerjee
Thinking Forks Consulting, Bengaluru, Karnataka
Thinking Forks
envisions itself to be a
key enabler of growth
in the food industry
through a creative
blend of design
thinking, consumer
insights and industry
expertise 5657
Increasing Access
to Potable Water
Rituparna Das
Hydrotech Solutions, Kolkata, West Bengal
Based in Kolkata, Rituparna Das’ company Hydrotec Solutions aims
to help those with limited access to clean and affordable drinking
water. The social startup, founded in 2014, has been successful in
implementing its technologies in schools, hospitals, factories and
rural and urban communities across India.
The company provides many forms of water accessibility, ranging
from their AROSIA Water ATMs to industrial pumps and treatment
plants. Rituparna was set on using technology that could solve the
water crisis many rural and urban communities in India face. The IOT
real time monitoring technology allows for the quality of water to be
constantly assessed, ensuring safe drinking water for those who now
have access to it.
Hydrotec Solutions
provides solar
powered and cloud
connected water
dispensing systems
that enable sustainable
water management
techniques 5859
Ruchi Jain
Taru Naturals, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Empowering Small-Scale
Farmers Through Technology
and Fair Trade Markets
With topsoil depletion, groundwater
contamination, continued neglect of the
living, and working conditions for farm
labourers, there has been mounting
economic and environmental concerns
for the agricultural community. This made
Ruchi Jain found Taru Naturals. Quitting
her high paying corporate job, Ruchi has
focused on sustainable agriculture, striving
to empower a network of small-scale
farmers by leveraging upon India’s ancient
wisdom and sustainable agricultural
practices, while ensuring smarter ways of
incomes for the communities Taru engages
with.
Her goal has been to make this community
more resource efficient, by enabling
them to break free from the shackles of
poverty and promote gender equality.
The organisation trains these farmers
in regenerative agriculture techniques,
in addition to providing them with the
small-scale technology needed for their
businesses to flourish. Ruchi has been
able to impact the lives of more than 3,000
farmers across India, helping them connect
with fair trade markets and restaurants to
sell their produce.
Taru Naturals strives to
build self-sufficiency
across the value chain
for farm produce and
envisions to safeguard
sustainable rural
livelihoods & double
small-scale farmer
incomes 6061
Building a Movement of
Leaders to Transform the
Education System
While walking through Mumbai’s slums,
Shaheen Mistri saw the plight of neglected
children in India’s most marginalized and
forgotten communities. With a firm belief
that the lack of education was at the root of
many problems faced by these communities,
Shaheen Mistri focused her efforts on
projects that helped empower the young,
neglected children of India’s slums. She even
chose to relocate her education from Tufts
University to St. Xavier’s College, to be more
actively involved in her efforts to help the
disadvantaged youth.
With her growing concerns regarding India’s
education system, Shaheen could no longer
Shaheen Mistri
Teach for India, Mumbai, Maharashtra
be complacent. She founded Teach for India
in 2008 in an effort to solve the problems
she had identified in India’s education sector.
Teach for India, based on the proven model of
Teach for America, aims to educate children
from the most disadvantaged communities,
to provide them with the means to lift
themselves out of poverty.
Teach for India has made a fundamental
change to the way disadvantaged children
attain education by building a cohort of young
leaders to fuel the movement of overcoming
the inequalities that exist in India’s education
system. Today, Teach for India has nearly
38,000 students and over 1,000 fellows.
Teach for India provides
opportunities for
promising youth to
tackle the grassroot
realities of the Indian
education system 6263
Innovating
Food
Techonolgies
to Empower
Rural
Communities
Bastar Foods, founded by Jagdalpur native
Raziya attempts to bring R&D in food
technologies to the tribal belt of Bastar
and in surrounding areas of Chhattisgarh,
Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana.
Her vision is to implement a strong food
supply chain, raise awareness on nutrition
and promote health through good
quality food.
Raziya through Bastar Foods aims to
combat the many obstacles women in
her community face while attempting to
better their lives. Bastar Foods has set up
factories in rural communities that teach
women about food sciences, allowing
them to learn food production and create
eatables such as laddoos, which they
sell to maintain a steady flow of income.
Bastar Foods has helped empower
and mobilize women in rural areas to
better their knowledge and skills in food
production and has made them financially
independent.
Shaikh Raziya
Bastar Foods, Jagdalpur, Chhattisgarh
Bastar Foods is
bringing growth and
development to the
food industry in south
Chhattisgarh by
upskilling rural women
on best practices in
food tech 6465
Creating Inclusion
Through Greater
Accessiblity
Shilpi Kapoor
BarrierBreak, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Over 26 million Indians are differently-
abled. People with disabilities face an
insurmountable number of barriers in
society, making living independently a
challenge. Her mentor’s disability inspired
Shilpi Kapoor to innovate technology for
the benefit of the disabled population. She
started BarrierBreak, a company focused
on the accessibility of technology for those
with disabilities. The company uses digital
access as a way to bridge some of the
challenges differently-abled people
face daily.
Founded on three principles: technology,
hiring the differently-abled, and a for-profit
model, BarrierBreak creates technologies
that help those who do not have the motor
abilities to partake in physical activities
that can bring knowledge and joy. These
products range from assistive listening
devices, open inclusive libraries, braille
displayers and more.
BarrierBreak dreams of
a society with ease of
access to employment,
education, social life
and independent living
for all through the
support of technology 6667
Shilpa Malik
Bioscan Research, Ahmedabad, Gujarat
Enabling Early
Detection of Diseases
Over a million people in India are injured
due to Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).
Bioscan, founded by Shilpa Malik, provides
services that enable early detection of TBI
caused by various forms of accidents such
as falling, violence, natural calamities, and
road accidents. The Ahmedabad-based
startup has developed an affordable, non-
invasive screening tool for a quick on site
scan that can be effectively used to detect
intracranial haemorrhage in two minutes,
that can be used by a lay person.
One key reason TBI goes untreated is
because patients do not feel the need to
pursue further medical tests when they
experience mild symptoms, which results
in irreversible brain damage. Shilpa’s
company has proven that making products
easily accessible and portable can help
reduce the number of TBI patients that go
unadministered.
Bioscan Research
offers an affordable,
handy and non-
invasive screening
tool that effectively
detects, the often
undiagnosed,
intracranial bleeding 6869
Upskilling Healthcare’s
Frontline Workers
Health workers form the backbone of
India’s public health systems. With the
lack of access to hospitals and doctors,
many rely on their treatments to be
carried out by nurses and frontline health
workers. Noticing this pattern in the Indian
society, Shrutika Girdhar and her partner
founded Bodhi Health Education in 2012.
The organization has set up a platform
dedicated to providing quality training to
health workers, thus improving their skilling
and efficacy. Through this venture, Shrutika
aims to tackle the shortage of skilled
frontline health workers in India.
Using low cost mobile technology allied
with e-learning, Bodhi Health Education has
created a scalable and valuable resource
to assist Indian health workers in their
training. Since its inception, Bodhi Health
Education’s application has been utilized
by more than 45,000 medical students and
medical professionals, and is projected
to impact 100 million Indians in various
regions.
Shrutika Girdhar
Bodhi Health Education, Gurugram, Haryana
Bodhi Health Education
aims to improve
knowledge and skills
of frontline health
professionals in India 7071
Shuchi Pandya
Pipa Bella Accessories, Mumbai, Maharashtra
Shuchi Pandya, a Wharton Business School alumna realized a paradigm shift
in Indian society in terms of decision making when it came to the purchase
of jewellery - an industry previously dominated by men. Upon this realization,
Shuchi created Pipa Bella, a company that aims to create ‘aspirational yet
affordable’ jewellery.
Pipa Bella tries to capture the Indian woman’s identity and sense of style. The
in-house design team often incorporates traditional Indian manufacturing
techniques in the jewellery design and focuses on perfection. Banking heavily
on the use of technology to run her business, Shuchi uses data to predict
market trends that will hit India in the near future and leverages the latest
innovations for her company’s inventory planning. With exquisite quality, the
brand has now amassed a loyal following among its urban audience.
Making Traditional
Jewellery
Aspirational
The Pipa Bella
brand has been
revolutionizing digital
fashion with its range
of classic and bold
accessories for the
modern Indian woman 7273
Making Learning Fun
and Engaging
Sneha Sundaram
Kutuki, Bengaluru, Karnataka
Founded in 2017 by Sneha Sundaram, Kutuki is a company
that focuses on bridging the learning gap that exists in
Indian pre-schools. While exposure to western television
programs are abundant in the homes of young children,
the learning from these are few. Through their mobile
application, Kutuki provides an elaborate curriculum for
preschool students which banks on different forms of
stimuli such as music, colors, and words.
Kutuki has garnered over 50,000 users till date and attempts
to use data to better their understanding of how information
is received by these young children. The application’s
content includes many regional languages of India, thus
being inclusive and accessible to all learners.
Kutuki nurtures the
natural curiosity of
children through
engaging, meaningful
and age appropriate
and content for early
learning 7475
Transforming
Education in
Ladakh
Sujata Sahu
17000 ft Foundation, Gurugram, Haryana
17000 ft Foundation is a social enterprise
focused on providing education and exposure to
the communities in the most rural and isolated
regions of Ladakh. The company was founded
when avid trekker, Sujata Sahu, went on a three
day trek to a remote village in Ladakh. Seeing
eager children wanting to learn even though
the contents of textbooks were alien to them,
inspired her to start 17000 ft Foundation.
17000 ft Foundation aims to reduce the
desperate exodus of indigenous communities
to faraway cities. The organisation works to
educate children and adults in the remote
regions of Ladakh, along with building
infrastructure and creating exposure for the
rest of society. Her foundation has worked with
over 250 communities in Ladakh, mobilising
community members to contribute to their
development efforts.
The program focuses on improving education
in government schools, creating livelihood
opportunities, and generating exposure through
interaction with the outside world. Their work
spans the entire 65,000 sq. km. of Ladakh,
and aims to impact other similarly remove and
inaccessible regions.
By digitizing 120
schools, launching
230 libraries and
setting up 140
playgrounds, 17000ft
attempts to enrich
livelihoods in remote
areas of India and
empower marginalized
communities 7677
WEP TEAM
LEADERSHIP TEAM
Mr. Arnab Kumar
Programme Director,
NITI Aayog
Ms. Anna Roy
Chairperson WEP,
Senior Adviser, NITI Aayog
EXECUTION TEAM
Abhas VyasAnkan De
Sanjana Mohanty Siddhant Sawhney
Deepika Raman
Tanay Mahindru
Garima Agrawal
Yash Mehrotra
Mansha Siraj @NITIAayog
@NITIAayog
@WEP_NITIAayog
@WomenEntrepreneurshipPlatform
In partnership with