AP’s Saraswathi wins CII woman exemplar award

Vijayawada: In a huge encouragement to women empowerment, Saraswathi Malluvalasa from Vizianagaram in Andhra Pradesh won the CII Foundation Woman Exemplar Award in micro enterprises category.

She received the award along with other winners from Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in New Delhi on Friday. CII Foundation announced the Woman Exemplar Award 2024 winners at the CII Annual Business Summit 2024. The awards recognise grassroots women leaders from rural and resource-poor areas who have faced poverty, social and gender-based discrimination but with their firm resolve, emerged as community leaders who are driving social change.

Awards were presented to Ranjita Pawar from Osmanabad, Maharashtra, in the education category; Rumi Perween from Kishanganj, Bihar, in the health category in addition to Saraswathi Malluvalasa from Vizianagaram in micro-enterprise category. Each winner received a trophy, a certificate, and a cash award of Rs 3 lakh.

For the 19th edition of the award, over 300 nominations were received from across India. After a multi-level selection process which involved telephonic interviews and visits to personally meet the nominated women and see the impact of their work, 16 finalists were identified. In the Education category, the finalists were Basmati Gagrai from Jharkhand, Bideshini Patel from Odisha, Pramila Chouhan from Madhya Pradesh, Ranjita Pawar from Maharashtra and Sandhya Devi from Odisha.