The Devis

Aditi Mangaldas, Performer and Educator

Aditi Mangaldas

Performer and Educator

Aditi Mangladas's name is synonymous with fusion in contemporary dance. She has built on the base of classical idiom of Kathak and given it a modern character. She has travelled the world with present-day tales of traditional Indian compositions. A hallmark of her Kathak rendition is referencing its rich legacy but experimenting with newer expressions of storytelling. She keeps the flame of Indian tradition alight and passes the sparkles to young artists and audiences.

Dr.Meenakshi Jain, Historian of Cultures and Religions in India

Dr.Meenakshi Jain

Historian of Cultures and Religions in India

Dr Meenakshi Jain’s nomination to the Rajya Sabha earlier this year was a firm recognition of a lifetime spent in understanding and explaining Indian cultures. She is a historian whose exposition of the development of religion has enthralled students and scholars alike. Her oeuvre also bears testimony to staying course with academic rigour while charting an independent trajectory. She has been prolific and contrarian on a vast canvas.

In Sati, she explores the British Evangelicals’ fraught relationship with Indian cultures, while in Rama and Ayodhya, she traces the origins of the Rama’s story to a time farther than what is commonly believed to be the beginning. Her prolonged devotion to the Indic perspective has taken her to the prestigious Nehru Memorial Museum and Library and the Indian Council of Social Science Research as a senior fellow.

Dr.Radhika Batra, Paediatrician, Public Health Expert, and Founder of Every Infant Matters

Dr.Radhika Batra

Paediatrician, Public Health Expert, and Founder of Every Infant Matters

Dr.Radhika Batra is a young doctor who chose to slay health demons with an innocuous vitamin and saved lakhs of lives in two continents. She has made Vitamin A the chief weapon in her arsenal as she sets out to devour malnutrition among children and women through her organisation Every Infant Matters.

Her noble mission has recorded success, impacting lives in India, the Philippines, and Nigeria. Through her programme of fighting malnutrition, she has saved over 5,50,000 children in these countries from irreversible blindness. The world has lauded this TEDx speaker for her global achievements with recognition coming from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Government of India, World Economic Forum, and Thomsan Reuters Foundation. She is now aiming to reduce gender-based violence, female genital mutilation, and protection of young girls from sexual predators in Africa and India.

Shradha Sharma, Founder and CEO, YourStory

Shradha Sharma

Founder and CEO, YourStory

Shradha Sharma has seen several start-up founders closely, noticing the maturing of a segment that throws up unicorns with ease. Sharma wears two coats on most times: she can be called a media entrepreneur and also a chronicler of emerging entrepreneurs at the same time. It will be a just and apt description of her to say that the journey of the first wave of Indian unicorns could be mapped to the phases of her career as a media personality and entrepreneur.

Sudha Bhattacharya, Professor and Geneticist

Sudha Bhattacharya

Professor and Geneticist

Sudha Bhattacharya has lived genetics since her school days. A journey that started with her discovering a DNA helix in a textbook has reached a stage where the world discovers gene expressions and protein compositions through her research papers. She is a senior scientist at Ashoka University now, after teaching and researching on molecular biology at Jawaharlal Nehru University. She is one of the few scientists in the country who have been fellows of three major science academies. She has stayed prolific throughout her celebrated career, publishing more than 120 papers in reputed journals. She is one of those rare people who have given more to society than taken from it.

Lakshmi V Venkatesan, Mentor for young Entrepreneurs

Lakshmi V Venkatesan

Mentor for young Entrepreneurs

Lakshmi Venkataraman Venkatesan was an engineer when only men thought of developing technology. She made a mark at the behemoth Bell Labs in the US and quit in 1988. She decided to prepare the Indian youth for a competitive world of wealth generation, and thus was born Bharatiya Yuva Shakti Trust, with blessings from corporate icons like J R D Tata and Escorts founder Har Prasad Nanda. She started with the modest goal of grooming just 12 young Indians for entrepreneurship in 1992. Thirty-three years later, the trust is a phenomenon of mentoring with operations in 50 districts in 16 states.

Anita Kundu, Mountaineer and Motivator

Anita Kundu

Mountaineer and Motivator

Anita Kundu has Himalayan reputation. She is the only Indian woman who has conquered the Everest both from the Nepal and China sides. She first hoisted the tricolour on Peak XV from the Nepal side in 2013, when she was just 22. Her passion took her to all seven top summits of the seven continents, which is no mean achievement given the humble background she has risen from. She was all of 12 when her father passed away. With an inspiring life as example, she is a brand ambassador of many social causes.

Rina Dhaka, Fashion Designer and Entrepreneur

Rina Dhaka

Fashion Designer and Entrepreneur

Rina Dhaka can be called a confident India’s fashion statement. She is the gorgeous voice of a country that started making itself heard in fashionable cities of Europe and North America before anyone had seen live shows on TV screens. She was young, full of talent, and carried dreams of a generation in her work at a time when India was rediscovering its voice for a connected world. As she showcased her designs at convention-defying fashion shows in Delhi, Bombay, Milan, Paris, and New York, she got hailed as the Gautier of the East. From the Best Designer accolade at Miami Fashion Week 2004 to the Rajiv Gandhi Excellence Award, there is hardly an industry award whose history has not got enriched through an association with her. Hers is a name that can be seen on the high street or hang on a gallery wall.

Simran Sharma, World Para Champion

Simran Sharma

World Para Champion

Simran Sharma chose to be an athlete at school despite a visually impaired status. By the time she hit the 20s, she was already a bright star in the para games arena. She won two silver medals at the Asian Para Games 2022 and a gold in 2024 World Para Championships in Japan.

Sonia Mathur, Senior Advocate

Sonia Mathur

Senior Advocate

Sonia Mathur’s versatility corresponds with the whole gamut of cases a seasoned judge has to deal with in their entire career. She argues taxation, consumer rights, corporate law, labour issues, and criminal law with equal finesse. There is no court in the country, from the sessions to the Supreme Court, including tribunals and special courts, where she has not left a mark on the bench. The High Court of Delhi gave her the senior’s gown in 2017.

The Central Bureau of Investigation and the Income Tax Department often look up to her in higher courts as their standing counsel to make themselves heard and bring law evaders to book. As a counsel, patron of law, and an editor of literature on law, she inspires young lawyers and has helped mould many careers.

Smita Prakash, Editor and CEO, Asian News International

Smita Prakash

Editor and CEO, Asian News International

Smita Prakash is a phenomenon of our times and place. She is Indian and global and at ease with both personas. She is a chronicler of our times like no other. As a journalist, she observes power from up close and dons the hat of an analyst who must speak diligently to the reader. In the three decades she has travelled to report extensively on events that matter to India and foreign audiences, she has built a reputation as a fact-driven journalist.

As early as in the 1990s, when satellite TV arrived, she was one of the first women journalists to have dedicated news shows on Indian screens. Her relevance can be gauged from the fact that, be it politicians or celebrities, they all want to be on her podcast, for, they know, Smita Prakash amplifies, analyses, criticises, and demands answers for the sake of people.

Archana Jahagirdar, Founder and Managing Partner, Rukam Capital

Archana Jahagirdar

Founder and Managing Partner, Rukam Capital

Archana Jahagirdar stands out as one of those successful fund managers who have successfully bent gender in India and made a name globally. She is primarily a storyteller, having started out as a journalist before becoming a venture capitalist. As a VC, she started grooming entrepreneurs who bought into India’s growth story. The government took note of her mission and selected her as a member of the National Startup Advisory Committee.