In the last ten years, for Indians, the startup space has undergone speedy evolution and thus acquired international repute for its creativity, expansion, and survivability. Venture capitalists have played a historic role in sculpting the landscape by backing early-stage ideas and nurturing promising startups. Historically dominated by males, the venture capital industry today welcomes a fresh influx of young women who bring with them valuable perspectives.
With their long-term vision, strategic insights, and inclusive leadership, these women are not only shaping the future direction of entrepreneurship in India but are also actively promoting venture capital for women-led businesses, ensuring more equitable access to funding and fostering a diverse and dynamic startup ecosystem.
This article features Five of the Youngest Female VCs changing the field of the venture capital industry. These women have taken various paths by daring to take unconventional routes, building intimidating portfolios and inspiring others through their journeys. They stand for the bigger, upward-looking, and new generation of venture capital practitioners in India. Some are also associated with or advocate for initiatives like a women's venture capital fund, aimed at increasing access to funding for women entrepreneurs and encouraging gender diversity in the startup ecosystem.
Dhanashree Mandhani, Founder & CEO, Salam Kisan
An emerging businesswoman, Dhanashree Mandhani, is heavily influencing the agri-tech industry in India. She founded PRYM Solutions in 2021 at the age of 19, and she currently heads Salam Kisan-a tech platform-for-the-benefit of farmers. A marketing and finance graduate from UIUC Gies College of Business, Dhanashree combines her love for problem-solving with business acumen. Through Salam Kisan, farmers get access to markets, real-time updates, and precision farming tools. The platform promotes smarter, data-driven farming for higher crop yields and income. Dhanashree, with her passion for innovation and rural empowerment, is among those rare young leaders driving sustainable change. Her success adds to the growing visibility of women in VC and their impact across sectors like agriculture and technology.
Aditi Gupta, Founder, Menstraupedia
Aditi Gupta, best known as the co-founder of Menstrupedia, is now making her mark as one of India’s youngest women venture capitalists. She brings in a different and compassionate viewpoint to venture capital, as she bears over a decade's experience in menstrual health education and has a background in social entrepreneurship. She emerged as a changemaker with Menstrupedia, the award-winning website that educates menstruation to young girls through stories and comics.
Some of the honors Aditi has acquired include being named to the list of BBC's 100 Most Influential Women and Forbes India 30 Under 30. Her venture capital investments in early-stage firms focus on education, health technology, and social impact. A strong advocate for VC funding for women, Aditi supports mission-driven founders and champions inclusive innovation across the Indian startup ecosystem.
Sai Gole, Co-founder, BharatAgri
One of India's youngest female venture capitalists, Sai Gole, brings sharp insight and high-end technological thinking to investments and agriculture. The 26-year-old Co-Founder of BharatAgri has been helping farmers to plan better for crops and increase productivity and their earnings by using an amalgamation of data science and real-world farming requirements. Their platform is aimed at streamlining decisions regarding what to grow, when, and how, relying on an algorithm that dispenses customized farming advice. What began as a small project at the Centre for Innovation at IIT Madras has grown into a prominent agri-tech startup with over 100,000 users.
Sai is presently a venture capitalist and invests in businesses with her entrepreneurial experiences aimed at long-standing issues in rural India. A firm believer in venture capital for female entrepreneurs, she focuses on agri-tech, sustainability, and innovative rural empowerment.
Nikita Tiwari, Co-Founder, NEERx Technovation
Nikita Tiwari is one of the youngest female Indian venture capitalists and leads NEERx Technovation, a fusion of purpose and innovation. As a passionate agri-deep technology advocate, she helped in developing SHOOL, a diagnostic facility in a sensor that provides on-the-spot information regarding farm conditions, including soil health. ISRO, IARI, and thousands of farmers across India currently use her technology to fight soil degradation, maximize crop productivity, and reduce cost.
Nikita has become a prominent voice in sustainable farming solutions due to her profound experiences in technology and grassroots needs. She brings to the venture capital industry a unique combination of scientific expertise and entrepreneurial spirit. As part of her investment journey, she actively supports initiatives like the women's venture capital fund, focusing on useful, scalable innovations in agriculture, climate resilience, and rural digitization.
Srishti Mandaar, Co-Founder, Red Otter Farms
Being one of the youngest venture capitalists in the country, Srishti Mandaar has taken up another intervention of sustainable agriculture at that. Red Otter Farms was founded by Srishti Mandaar for promoting environmentally friendly aquaponics and precision farming; she has a background in development communication. Srishti leads the SamriddhFarms programme, which empowers rural women through backyard farming, helping them earn independently using soilless, smart farming methods. And through her efforts, farming got modernized by way of providing end-to-end assistance including market access and setup.
As a young venture capitalist, she actively funds agritech companies that are transforming the production and distribution of food. Through the grounding of farming experience mixed with an acute investment lens, she is shaping the future of India's agricultural land, focusing on sustainability, women empowerment, and rural development.
Conclusion
In conclusion, India’s VC ecosystem is gradually becoming more diverse and inclusive, thanks to a growing number of female venture capitalists who are stepping into leadership roles with courage and clarity. The five VCs empowered in this article, Dhanashree Mandhani, Aditi Gupta, Sai Gole, Nikita Tiwari, and Srishti Mandaar, are continuously advancing the venture capital business with respect to startups that they finance as well as the philosophy they symbolize.
Their stories provide inspiration that women can courageously lead not only with money but with their values and that a difference in age does not stand in the way of vision. The startup ecosystem in India will certainly lose out if there is not a diversity of perspectives, more empathy, and bold future bets with more women on the VC side.
