Move over young businessmen who think they are shouldering the mountainous workload meant for a male, the girls are taking over.
The days of sons of business tycoons taking over from their dads are long gone and now it the young Indian women who are making their mark.
The fresh entrants in the Indian business environment are a young bunch of confident women in the clutch of 20-something.
From Roshni Nadar, offspring of Indian tech billionaire Shiv Nadar, to Lakshmi Venu, the 26-year-old daughter of TVS supremo Venu Srinivasan, these fresh entrants in India are here for the long run, the Economic Times reports.
"It was only in 2006 that I decided to join the group full time, at which time I went back to school to professionally train myself and get further educated in order to take on greater responsibilities within the group,” said Divya Modi, who holds a 24 per cent stake in her father B K Modi's Spice Group.
“As a group, we aspire to be a $10 billion group in the future and I would like to play my part in making that happen by creating value in the areas of business that I'm focusing on - Innovative Technologies and Finance."
The skills acquired, through their management degrees, come handy for the young girls to be their father's right hand in business. An MBA from Kellogg School of Business, Roshni Nadar was recently appointed CEO of the HCL group’s holding company, giving her potential power and control over a $5 billion group with marquee customers such as Boeing and Airbus and an employee base of 60,000.
Ms Nadar, who studied MBA at the Kellogg University and is a trained classical musician, was appointed CEO and executive director at HCL Corp, the holding company, in April. She took over from her father who will continue to be the chairman and focus only on strategic issues.
Mr Nadar, who was in Chennai along with his daughter to announce developments in their educational initiatives, said his daughter’s role will be confined to just HCL CorpBeing from a business family, their hand on the varied matters of the industry at large keeps them well-grounded to excel in the arena.
Twenty eight-year-old Devita Saraf, director at Zenith and CEO of Vu Technologies describes herself as a young, curious and naughty girl. She started training at Zenith at the age of 16.
“As a young person, especially as a woman, everyone is willing to give you free advice. You have to listen, learn and appreciate people’s roles in your business.”
One of the best known Indian women holding economic clout is Indra Nooyi, chair and chief executive of PepsiCo.
Nooyi was born into a Tamil family. She completed her schooling from Holy Angels AIHSS, Chennai. She received a Bachelor's degree in Chemistry from Madras Christian College in 1974, and earned an MBA at the Indian Institute of Management in Calcutta.
Beginning her career in India, Nooyi held product manager positions at Johnson & Johnson and textile firm Mettur Beardsell. She was admitted to Yale School of Management in 1978 and earned a Master's degree in Public and Private Management. Graduating in 1980, Nooyi started at The Boston Consulting Group, and then held strategy positions at Motorola and Asea Brown Boveri.