Mother Teresa

Teresa, Mother, 1910–97, Roman Catholic

missionary in India, winner of the 1979 Nobel
Peace Prize, she went to India at 17, becoming
a nun and teaching school in Calcutta (now
Kolkata). In 1948 she left the convent and
founded the Missionaries of Charity, which
now operates schools, hospitals, orphanages,
and food centers worldwide. She was beatified
by Pope John Paul II in 2003.
First Woman President of
India

Pratibha Patil 
First Woman Prime Minister
of India

Indira Gandhi 
First Woman governor of
Independent India

Sarojini Naidu
First Woman Chief Minister
of an Indian State

Sucheta Kripalani
First Woman Speaker of
Lok Sabha

Meira Kumar 
 First Woman judge in
Supreme Court

Meera Sahib Fatima Bibi

First Woman to receive
Ashoka Chakra

Niraja Bhanot
First Woman to hold a Union
Cabinet post

Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit

First Woman IPS
Officer of India

Kiran Bedi 
 First Woman Director
General of Police (DGP)

Kanchan Chaudhary Bhattacharya

 Puja Thakur

• She became the first officer to lead the

Inter-Service Guard of Honour that was
inspected by US President Barack Obama.
She says she joined the Indian Air Force
because of the life she wanted for herself. 
 Harshini Kanhekar 

• She received the title of India’s first

female fire fighter about ten years back.
She believes in creating barriers and
making history, and has clearly done the
same. 
First Indian Woman to climb
Mount Everest

Bachendri Pal 
First Indian Woman to
win Booker Prize

Arundhati Roy
 First Woman
Ambassador

C.B. Muthamma
 Rajeshwari Chatterjee

• Rajeshwari Chatterjee was the first woman

engineer from Karnataka. In 1946, she was
given a scholarship by the (then) Govt of
Delhi to study abroad, and studied at the
University of Michigan where she obtained
her Master’s degree from the Department of
Electrical Engineering. After obtaining a
Ph.D degree, she returned to India and joined
the Department of Electrical Communication
Engineering at IISc
 Kalpana Chawla

• Chawla was the first Indian woman to go to

space. She passed away in the infamous
Columbia disaster in 2003 when the space
shuttle disintegrated over Texas while re-
entering the earth's atmosphere hours before it
was scheduled to conclude its 28th mission.
None of the crew members survived.
 Tessy Thomas

Tessy Thomas, or 'Missile Woman of

India', is India's first woman scientist
to head a missile project (hence the
title!). She is the Project Director for
Agni-IV missile in Defence Research
and Development Organization.
 Anuradha TK

• GEOSAT Programme Director at ISRO

Satellite Centre
• Senior-most woman officer at ISRO, the sky
is the limit - she specialises in sending
communication satellites into space that sit at
least 36,000km from the earth's centre.
• The scientist who has worked with Isro for
the past 34 years first thought about space
 Nandini Harinath

• Nandini Harinath is a rocket

scientist at ISRO’s Satellite
Centre.
 Paramjit Khurana

• Paramjit Khurana (born 15 August 1956)

is an Indian scientist in Plant
Biotechnology, Molecular
Biology, Genomics who is presently
Professor in the Department of Plant
Molecular Biology in the University of
Delhi, Delhi. She has received many awards
and published more than 125 scientific
papers.
 Usha Barwale Zehr

• Usha Barwale Zehr, aged 50, works for

Maharashtra Hybrid Seeds Company Limited,
Jalna. She is one of the most talented
researchers in the field of Botany. She
produced India's first genetically modifies Bt
brinjal. Maharashtra Hybrid Seeds Company
came to limelight in the year 2000 for her major
efforts in producing this genetically modified
food. 
 Mitali Mukerji

• Mitali Mukerji, is a Senior Principal Scientist at

the CSIR Institute of Genomics and Integrative
Biology with notable achievement in the field
of human genomics. She is also involved in an
innovative study titled “Ayurgenomics”, which is
blending of the traditional Indian system of medicine
with genomics. She is recipient of the
prestigious Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award for 2010
for her contribution in the field of Medical Sciences.
 Padamsree Warrior

• One of the brightest Indian technology stars in

the US,who was recently in news for stepping
down as Chief Technology Officer(CTO) at
Cisco, a role she held for seven years. Warrior,
who was named the 71st most powerful woman
in the world by Forbes magazine last year.
 Ruchi Sanghvi

• She literally has all the checks on an

engineer’s To-do list. MS from
Carnegie Mellon University, she was
the first female engineer hired by,
Facebook! Having left that job to
accomplish the next checkbox. a
startup.
 Meenakshi Chatterjee

• Proud alumnus of BITS-Pilani Meenakshi

Chatterjee was listed in the Business Insider
as "The 25 Most Powerful Women Engineers
In Tech". An Electrical and Electronics
Engineer, she is an inspiration for all those
who plan to get core jobs. She is a senior
hardware engineer at Twitter and  is
helping run Twitter's huge data center,
keeping the Fail Whale away.
 Arundhati Bhattacharya

• Bhattacharya, an Indian banker, was

the first woman to become the
chairperson of the State Bank Of
India (SBI). She has also been
featured in the Forbes Most Powerful
Women list in the 36th slot.
 Chanda Kochhar

• Kochhar, ICICI Bank CEO, recently made it

to the Fortune list of 25 most powerful women
in the Asia-Pacific region, and stands first
among other Indian women. She has been
featured in this list consistently since
2005. She has also been honoured with the
Padma Bhushan Award in 2010, the third
highest civilian honour by the Indian
government, for her services to the banking
sector.
 Indra Nooyi

• Indra Krishnamurthy Nooyi (born 28

October 1955) is an American,
business executive and the
current Chairperson and Chief
Executive Officer of PepsiCo, the
second largest food and beverage
business in the world by net revenue.
 Mary Kom

• 5-time World Amateur Boxing Champion,

Mary Kom did not let motherhood or
conventions of the society hinder her from
achieving global recognition in the field
she loves. She is also one of the only
women boxing champion to have gotten
a medal for each of the six championships
she's participated in!
 Arunima Sinha

• Arunima Sinha is the world's first female

amputee (and India's first amputee)
mountain climber, who scaled Mt. Everest!
• She has also climbed five of the world's
eight highest summits!
 Reena Kaushal Dharmshaktu

• Skiing through the deserted and

coldest regions in the world,
mountaineer and Delhi-based outdoor
instructor Reena, along with seven
other women, became the first woman
to reach the southern most tip of the
word, the South Pole, all in 38 days
  Bhakti Sharma

• Bhakti Sharma is India's (and Asia's)

first woman to swim 1.4 miles, in the
Antarctic Ocean, in 52 minutes
nonetheless! She broke world records
and, since then, has conquered all the 5
oceans of the world!
 Saina Nehwal 

• She's only 24. Yet, she's the first Indian

woman to win a medal in badminton at
the Olympics. And that's not it. This 20-
something has a lot more titles in her
kitty. She is also the first Indian woman
to win the World Junior Badminton
Championship. 
 Sania Mirza

• She was ranked India's no.1 tennis

player by the Women's Tennis
Association. Mirza has played
extensively and has won a total of 14
medals. 
Pusarla Venkata Sindhu

• At the 2016 Summer Olympics, she

became the first Indian woman to
win an Olympic silver medal. She is
one of the two Indian badminton
players to ever win an Olympic medal 
 Sakshi Malik

• Indian woman who made our country proud globally

by winning another Olympic medal. Sakshi Malik
won billions of hearts by when she won a bronze
medal in Summer Olympics 2016. Hailing from
one the most hypocrite Indian states Haryana, Sakshi
Malik proved the actual worth of a girl and broke all
the stereotype of our male dominating society. She
struggled throughout her way to bring such an honor
to our country.
 Deepa Malik

• Deepa Malik is the first Indian woman to

win a medal in Paralympic Games and
won a Silver medal at the 2016 Summer
Paralympics in the shot put. She has won
accolades for her participation in various
adventure sports. She has received number
of awards from state and central government
for her achievements and for making India
proud even being physically challenged.
 Dipa Karmakar

• Dipa Karmakar is the first Indian female

gymnast ever to compete in the Olympics.
Though she attained 4th position in Women’s
Vault Gymnastics event of Rio Olympics
2016, she made her place in everyone’s heart
for taking India to new heights in artistic
gymnastics.
 Tania Sachdev

• This young chess player holds World

Chess Federation or FIDE titles of
International Master and Woman
Grandmaster!
 Rupa Devi

• Rupa Devi, from Tamil Nadu, became India's

first international referee for FIFA and is
all set to officiate international football
matches
 Harmanpreet Kaur

• In India where cricket is considered as male sport,

Harmanpreet Kaur created history by becoming
the first woman to be signed by an overseas
Twenty20 franchise. Sydney Thunder,
the Women’s Big Bash League champions, signed
her for the 2016–17 season. She is India’s T20
team captain.