Roshni Nadar Malhotra, Chairperson of HCL Tech, has retained her position as the richest woman for the second year in a row, with a wealth of ₹83,330 crore. Daughter of HCL founder Shiv Nadar, she took over her father’s role when he stepped down in July, 2020.

Falguni Nayar, founder of beauty and lifestyle retail company Nykaa, has overtaken Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw of Biocon, to become the richest self-made woman in India, amassing a wealth of ₹57,520 crore. She was also the biggest gainer in terms of percentage growth, with her wealth shooting up by 963 per cent, revealed the Kotak Private Banking Hurun - Leading Wealthy Women List’.

Pharma power

Given the turbulence in the pharma industry, Mazumdar’s wealth slipped 21 per cent to ₹29,030 crore. Based on their net worth as on last December-end, Nilima Motaparti of Divi’s Lab, and Radha Vembu of multinational tech company Zoho, followed with assets of ₹28,180 crore and ₹26,260 crore.

The cumulative wealth of the top-100 in the list surged 53 per cent to ₹4.17 lakh crore last year and contributed two per cent of the country’s nominal GDP.

Oisharya Das, CEO (Private Banking), Kotak Mahindra Bank said over the years, Indian women are slowly yet surely coming into their own and carving a space for themselves through knowledge, excellence, passion and empathy.

The wealth of women in the list tripled with the cut-off this year pegged at ₹300 crore against ₹100 crore in the previous year.

Affluent club grows

Significantly, almost one-fourth of the list constitutes new entrants led by Neha Narkhede (wealth ₹13,380 crore) co-founder of Confluent, a streaming data tech company.

Pharma leads the list with 12 in the fray, followed by healthcare with 11 and consumer goods with nine women. With four members, Apollo Hospitals contributed the maximum number of women leaders, followed by Metro Shoes and Devi Sea Foods with two each.

Anas Rahman Junaid, Managing Director, Hurun India said women-led wealth creation directly improves women’s employment, corresponding families and society.

Among the eight start-up founders, Divya Gokulnath (36) of Byju’s and Ruchi Kalra (38) of OfBusiness have registered the highest wealth of ₹4,550 crore and ₹2,600 crore. Four unicorns co-founded by women have been featured in the list.

Kanika Tekriwal, 33, owner of private jet charter provider Jetsetgo is the youngest self-made woman in the list, while nine out of the 20 women under the age of 40 years are self-made.

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