ACT For Women

Accelerating India's progress on women's workforce participation.

Using data, tech-led platforms and collaboration to reach parity on women's representation inside India's organisations — with an initial focus on the startup ecosystem and the demand-side levers that decide whether women actually stay in the workforce.

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The Challenge

At the bottom of the global ranking on women's economic participation

According to the 2023 World Economic Forum Gender Gap Index, India ranks at the bottom globally on women's economic participation and opportunity. The gap shows up in employment rates, in pay parity and in the trajectory of careers once women do enter the workforce.

Research suggests that increasing women's labour-force participation and enabling gender equity at the workplace could add $6 trillion to India's GDP by 2050. But the emphasis so far has been on addressing supply-side and policy-level challenges — and there has been limited focus on enabling employers as a serious lever of change.

19%

Women of working age currently employed or seeking employment

47%

Women suffered permanent job losses during the COVID-19 pandemic

Our Thesis

Working with employers — starting with startups

The changing nature of employment in India offers a unique opportunity to address gender diversity at the workplace. An increasing body of evidence suggests that lifting women's workforce participation unlocks real value for organisations — with measurable impact on talent, innovation, reputation and financial performance.

ACT For Women aims to accelerate India's progress towards gender equality through data, tech-led platforms and collaboration — ultimately working towards parity on women's representation inside India's organisations. We do this by scaling evidence-backed innovations with and within organisations, starting with startups, to systematically address the demand-side barriers to women's employment.

Generate Insights

Build a body of knowledge for the startup ecosystem — identifying the key enablers of gender diversity and sharing customised recommendations with startups, founders and policy stakeholders.

Build Capacity

Support startups in replicating best practices that have already been proven to work — building scalable models that surface a clear business case for gender diversity, not just a moral one.

Catalyse Innovation

Give grants to incubate new innovations, scale impactful solutions and leverage technology that helps startups address the demand-side barriers to women's employment.

Our Portfolio

The founders we back in Women

A focused set of ventures that route economic opportunity to women — across rural distribution, mid-career learning and the AI data economy.

Frontier Markets

A tech-first venture running an assisted e-commerce platform — training and equipping a rural all-women salesforce of Sahelis to market and sell products and services to rural consumers through the Meri Saheli app.

Harappa

A curated online learning platform for mid-level women professionals — helping them navigate their career journeys through a curriculum rooted in academic research, expert insights and behavioural science.

Karya

A micro-tasking app that enables under-served communities to complete simplified AI/ML data tasks, earn supplementary income and access upskilling opportunities and career guidance.

A programme by ACT For Women

Pact For Gender Parity

The Pact For Gender Parity is a collective of India's leading startups who are actively prioritising gender-equal workplaces as a way to lift women's representation inside the ecosystem — from entry-level hires to senior leadership.

If you're a startup founder or CHRO, the Pact is the fastest way to plug into a community of peers solving the same problem — sharing what works, holding each other to public commitments, and helping India improve its women's workforce participation one company at a time.

ACT Capital Foundation For Social Impact is a not-for-profit company incorporated and registered under Section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013 (CIN: U85300KA2021NPL148543). All donations made to ACT Capital Foundation are eligible for income-tax deduction under Section 80G of the Income Tax Act.