Mother Teresa: Mother Teresa, born as Anjeze Gonxhe Bojaxhiu, was a Roman Catholic nun. She left her home at a tender age of 18 to join an Irish group of sisters namely Sisters of Loreto. Mother Teresa has founded the Missionaries of Charity, which at the time of her death had approximately 610 missions in 123 countries. Mother Teresa looked after the sick, poor, orphaned for almost 45 years. She was also awarded Nobel Peace prize in 1979.

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Mother Teresa: Mother Teresa, born as Anjeze Gonxhe Bojaxhiu, was a Roman Catholic nun. She left her home at a tender age of 18 to join an Irish group of sisters namely Sisters of Loreto. Mother Teresa has founded the Missionaries of Charity, which at the time of her death had approximately 610 missions in 123 countries. Mother Teresa looked after the sick, poor, orphaned for almost 45 years. She was also awarded Nobel Peace prize in 1979.

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Kalpana Chawla: Kalpana Chawla was not only the first Indian American astronaut, but she was also the first Indian woman in space.

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Mary Kom: Mary Kom started competing in the boxing championship in the international level at the young age of 18. She was initially shy about her interest in boxing, later became the first Indian woman boxer to have qualified for the 2012 Summer Olympics and winning the bronze medal. (BCCL/V Sunil)

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Kiran Bedi: Kiran Bedi is the first woman to join the Indian Police Service. She is famed for creating a reign of terror for Delhi's unruly and habitual traffic offenders by introducing cranes to tow away wrongly parked vehicles. (BCCL/Santanu Sarkar)

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Saina Nehwal: In 2010 Saina won three Super Series titles. She shot into limelight with a quarter-final finish at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. However, Saina's most fulfilling achievement would be the bronze medal she won at the London Games. (BCCL/S Eshwar)

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Brinda Karat: Communist Brinda Carat has many achievements in the sphere of politics to her credit. Having given up a job with Air India in London, she returned to India in the early 70s to work for the communist cause. (BCCL/Amrendra Jha)

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Jhumpa Lahiri: Debuting with the Pulitzer prize winning novel Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri belongs to a new generation of Indian origin writers who likes to tread on the path unwalked.

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Sushma Swaraj: The hard-talking BJP leader Sushma Swaraj entered politics at a young age and has not looked back since. (BCCL/Arvind Sharma)

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Indra Nooyi: Indra Nooyi is the current chairman and CFO of the second largest food and beverage business, PepsiCo. She's widely admired for her upward-spiralling career graph in the corporate world and has shown the world that women can indeed break the glass ceiling. (BCCL/Ashwani Nagpal)

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