Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Biocon Executive Chairperson Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw and Nykaa founder Falguni Nayar are now part of a club comprising six Indians who have made it to the Forbes’ annual list of The World’s 100 Most Powerful Women.
Nirmala Sitharaman
Sitharaman who is ranked at number 36 has made it to the list for the fourth time in a row.
Last year the 63-year-old minister was ranked at number 37 in the list, while she was in the 41st spot in 2020 and 34th in 2019.
Other prominent names
Other Indians that made it to the list include HCLTech Chairperson Roshni Nadar Malhotra (rank: 53), Securities And Exchange Board Of India (SEBI) Chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch (rank: 54), and Steel Authority Of India Chairperson Soma Mondal (rank: 67).
Malhotra, Mazumdar-Shaw and Nayar made it last year also at 52nd, 72nd and 88th spots respectively.
This year Mazumdar-Shaw is ranked 72, while Nayar is at 89th spot, according to the list released by Forbes on Tuesday.
Falguni Nayar
The Forbes list spoke about Nayar saying that the 59-year-old businessman “worked as an investment banker for two decades, leading IPOs and helping other entrepreneurs achieve their dreams. “
In 2012, she decided to work for herself, investing USD 2 million of her own savings to launch the beauty and retail company Nykaa.
She took it public in 2021 and became India’s “richest self-made woman”.
Buch, the first female chair of SEBI
On March 1, 56-year-old Buch became the first female chair of the SEBI, which oversees India’s more-than USD 3 trillion stock market ecosystem.
Mondal, 59 became the first woman to chair the state-run Steel Authority of India (SAIL) in January 2021.
She has led the company to record financial growth since taking over, with profits surged threefold to 120 billion rupees in her first year at the helm.
Shaw most successful
69-year-old Mazumdar-Shaw was one of India’s richest self-made women.
She founded India’s largest listed biopharmaceutical firm by revenue, in 1978.
The company has Asia’s largest insulin factory in Malaysia’s Johor region.
It also successfully forayed into the lucrative US market.
How were the women judged?
The list was determined by four main metrics: money,
- media
- impact and
- spheres of influence
- political leaders,
- weighed gross domestic products and populations
- for corporate leaders,
- revenues and
- employee counts;
- and media mentions
- and reach of all.
