Namrata Sundaresan | |
---|---|
Nationality | Indian |
Occupation(s) | cook and entrepreneur |
Known for | winning the Nari Shakti Puraskar |
Namrata Sundaresan is an Indian social entrepreneur, chef and cheesemaker. She won the 2017 Nari Shakti Puraskar with Anuradha Krishnamoorthy.
Namrata Sundaresan was born an Odia and moved to Chennai in Tamil Nadu after getting married. [1] She built her career through founding an international consulting agency. [1] Sundaresan learnt how to make cheese in Coonoor and then discussed with her friend Anuradha Krishnamoorthy becoming cheesemakers and employing disabled women. [2] They set up the artisanal cheese producers Käse and their social entrepreneurship led to winning the Nari Shakti Puraskar for 2017. [1] The awards were made to on International Women's Day in 2018 on behalf of the Ministry of Women and Child Development [3] by the President of India. The award is the highest award for women in India. [4]
Sundaresan is a self-taught chef. [5] She began cooking Peruvian food in 2017 for a supper club organised by Arundhati Balachandran and Suneethi Raj of LocalXO. [6] She visited the Gourmet Bazaar in Coimbatore with her cheeses in 2019. [7] By 2020, she had cooked 25 dinners and the group planned a new series with Sundaresan making dishes from her favourite cookbooks. [5]
The Nari Shakti Puraskar is an annual award given by the Ministry of Women and Child Development of the Government of India to individual women or to institutions that work towards the cause of women empowerment. It is the highest civilian honour for women in India, and is presented by the president of India on International Women's Day at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi. The award was instituted in 1999 under the title of Stree Shakti Puraskar, renamed and reorganised in 2015. It is awarded in six institutional and two individual categories, which carry a cash prize of 200,000 and 100,000 rupees, respectively.
Gargi Gupta is the founder and secretary of Voice Of World (NGO), a multi-unit non-profit organization for visually impaired, disabled, and orphaned children in Eastern India, headquartered in Kolkata, India.
Nilza Wangmo is an Indian restaurant owner and an enthusiast for the local food of the Ladakh region of northern India. Her work in 2019 was recognised with the highest award for women in India – Nari Shakti Puraskar.
B. Codanayaguy is an Electronics & Instrumentation Engineer at the ISRO. She is responsible for the instrumentation of control systems for the solid rocket motors used in rocket launches. She was given the highest award for women in India, the Nari Shakti Puraskar, at the Presidential Palace in 2017.
Mini Vasudevan is an Indian animal rights activist based in Coimbatore. She was awarded the Nari Shakti Puraskar in 2019.
Pushpa Preeya also known as either Pushpa NM or Pushpa N. M. is an Indian scribe, IT professional and volunteer. She is well known for her voluntary service of writing exams for visually impaired people.
Dr. Meena Sharma is an Indian journalist who was awarded the Nari Shakti Puraskar in 2016. She has identified scandals of children who did not look after their elderly parents and the large number of abortions that were taking place of pregnancies that were predicted to deliver a female child.
Anuradha N. Naik is an Indian researcher working at the Central Coastal Agricultural Research Institute (CCARI) in Goa. She received the 2018 Nari Shakti Puraskar for her work supporting tribal women in cultivating Khola chilies.
Iti Tyagi is an Indian designer and social entrepreneur. In 2015, she set up Craft Village which aims to connect artisans making handicrafts directly with buyers and patrons. She received the 2018 Nari Shakti Puraskar in recognition for her work empowering women.
Ambica Beri born Ambica Subherwal is an Indian art gallery owner. She was awarded the Nari Shakti Puraskar in 2018 for establishing a retreat for artists.
K. Syamalakumari aka Syamala Kumari is an Indian temple painter. This was an occupation traditionally carried out by men. Her work includes painting at the Sri Padmanabhaswamy Temple in Kerala. She has been awarded the Nari Shakti Puraskar.
The Beti Zindabad Bakery was established in the Jashpur district of Chhattisgarh, India in 2017. It employs survivors of human trafficking and won the 2017 Nari Shakti Puraskar.
Anuradha Krishnamoorthy is an Indian social entrepreneur and cheesemaker. She won the 2017 Nari Shakti Puraskar with her colleague Namrata Sundaresan.
Ela Lodh was an Indian obstetrician and gynaecologist. She received the 2020 Nari Shakti Puraskar posthumously on 8 March 2022.
Arti Rana is an Indian social entrepreneur. She helps fellow Tharu women to set up groups to make and sell handicrafts. In 2022, she received the Nari Shakti Puraskar, the highest civilian award for women in India.
Vanita Jagdeo Borade is an Indian conservationist and the founder of the Soyre Vanchare Multipurpose Foundation, which works in wildlife protection. She specializes in rescuing snakes and has been recognized as "India's first woman snake friend". Borade received the Nari Shakti Puraskar from the Indian government in recognition of her conservation efforts.
Sruti Mohapatra is a disability inclusion expert. Her expertise is in inclusive education and inclusive disaster management and planning.
Pooja Sharma is an Indian entrepreneur. She is the first woman in her village to work outside the home. She set up a self-help group that employs 150 women in a bakery, and has received awards in recognition of her achievements, including the Nari Shakti Puraskar, India's highest civilian honour for women.
Nivruti Rai was the head of Intel India and vice president of Intel Foundry Services. She has received the Nari Shakti Puraskar, the highest civilian honour for women in India.
Sandhya Dhar is an Indian disability rights activist. She was diagnosed with cerebral palsy at an early age and is a wheelchair user. She founded the Jammu Institute of General Education and Rehabilitation (JIGER) in 2015 to support disabled people and was awarded the 2020 Nari Shakti Puraskar.