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An Indian American woman who grew up in a small Gujarat town and taught herself English and marketing skills only after arriving here is now one of the top agents for New York Life in the US.

Before joining New York Life, her only selling experience was in a video store on Chicago's Devon Avenue, Jayshree Patel, 32, told.

Nevertheless, within months of joining New York life as an agent in 1997, she made it to the company's executive council, an acknowledgement of her marketing skills.

Less than seven years later, Patel has sold policies with a total face value of $300 million. She has done business worth $60 million this year itself, putting her among the top New York Life agents nationwide and in the fourth rank in the company's West Central region that includes the Midwest.

Patel, whose family hails from Sokhda town in Gujarat, credits her success to an unwavering ambition. She said even as the fourth of five sisters, who had lost their father when very young, she had the urge to "achieve something in life".

In 2000, she made it to the New York Life Chairman's Cabinet, an honour given to the top 50 agents. It is a distinction she has won every year since then.

Patel, a mother of three, keeps a hectic travel schedule, flying across the US 15 days a month. She holds licenses in 30 states and has clients across the country.

"But I do not have any clients in Chicago," she said. This is a calculated move. "That way I can devote time to my family, which, for me, comes first."

Patel said she takes her family obligations seriously. "My husband is the only child of his parents, and I am the only daughter-in-law. I want to spend quality time with them."

Husband Nilam Patel is the one who egged her to join the company. "He is my biggest motivation," she said, "he reminds me constantly of my goals."

Despite her success, Jayshree Patel does not believe in hard sell.

"I explain the benefits of life insurance to my potential clients. The example they most relate to is that life insurance is like the safety net over which acrobats perform. Death disturbs most Indian Americans. But it is a reality they cannot run away from. I tell them now is the time to think about income replacement for your family when you are not around.

"I never push them to buy insurance from me," she added, "If they say 'we will think about it' I leave them alone."

"Most Indian Americans do not have retirement planning. If you are the breadwinner of the family, it makes sense to insure yourself. Even a million dollar policy can be very competitive if you are healthy. A policy makes sense because today even a good funeral costs over $10,000."

Most of her clients remain Indian Americans. "We share the same culture and sometimes the same language. It is easy to relate to them."

"The biggest factor in her success is that she enjoys a challenge, and has a very strong desire to make it to the top," said husband Nilam Patel, who as a partner in New York Life, recruits, trains and manages personnel.

"Jayshree thoroughly enjoys what she does. My advice to her has always been 'never take no for an answer, and never take a no personally'."

Mohini Bhardwaj, gymnast and Olympic silver medallist, was voted India Abroad Person of the Year 2004 by a distinguished 11-member jury, headed by Sonal Shah, India Abroad Person of the Year 2003 .

Twenty-six year old Bhardwaj was one of the 123 nominations sent in by the readers of India Abroad and rediff.com for the India Abroad Person of the Year 2004.

Shah presented the award to Bhardwaj's father, Dr Kaushal Bhardwaj, an internist from Cincinnati, in a glittering ceremony held at the New York Palace hotel in New York on December 3.

The ceremony's impressive guestlist included US Congressman Joseph Crowley, co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans.

Mohini Bhardwaj, who was in Orlando, was unable to accept her trophy personally.

She is on a 40-city tour with the 2004 Olympic gymnastics team to raise funds for the Carrie Brown Foundation, a trust for less-privileged children. The trust was established by Bhardwaj's coach, Rita Brown, in memory of her youngest daughter who was killed in a car accident caused by drunken driving.

It took the jury for the India Abroad Person of the Year 2004 award over five hours of deliberations to select Bhardwaj as the winner.

The jury, which met in New York on October 30, included:

1. Sonal Shah, co-founder, Indicorps and vice president, Goldman Sachs.

2. Ravinder Singh Bhalla, attorney.

3. Subrata Chakravarty, worldwide TOP Editor, Bloomberg News.

4. Nisha Desai, director, Public Policy, InterAction.

5. Anita Gupta, vice president, Global Consumer Group Public Affairs, Citigroup.

6. Ann Kalayil, manager, Networking Services, University of Chicago and executive director, Indian American Democratic Organisation.

7. Kaleem Kawaja, engineering manager, National Aeronautical and Space Administration's Goddard Space Flight Centre and former president, Indian Muslims of America.

8. Rekha Malhotra, founder, Basement Bhangra™  and cofounder, Mutiny.

9. Debashish Mishra, founder and vice-chair, South Asian American Leaders of Tomorrow.

10. Parmatma Saran, professor and chairman, sociology and anthropology department, Baruch College, City University of New York.

11. Purvi Shah, executive director, Sakhi for South Asian Women.

The daughter of immigrants Indu and Kaushal Bhardwaj, Mohini began taking gymnastics classes at the age of four at a local club called Queen City Gymnastics in Indianapolis. She won a full scholarship to UCLA.

Despite solid performances at the NCAA national championships -- she earned an All-American ranking -- Mohini was a long shot for the US Olympics. 

In 2002, she had retired from competitive gymnastics after dislocating her elbow and running low on funds to pay for further training.

Yet, her dream of making the Olympic team would not allow her to give up.

Notwithstanding her age -- at 25, Mohini was much older than the average Olympic gymnast -- and the fact that she had to work at several jobs to pay for her training, Mohini made the US Olympic team.

And, in August at Athens, she led the team to victory.

"Our community is inspired to achieve because of the inspirational stories of those who have gone before. Mohini had no hope, no backing, no support -- all she had was a fierce belief in herself and a fiery determination to make the grade. Isn't that what this community is all about -- self-belief and determination?" asked a member of the jury.

Says Shah, "Mohini achieved many firsts as an Indian American. She is the first Indian American to represent the US in an Olympic competition -- what is more remarkable is that she made it to captain of the US women's gymnastics team. She is the first to lead her team to a silver medal, indeed the first Indian American to receive a silver medal. Her personal journey is an inspiration to us all, reminding us that hard work and determination can overcome personal challenges. Hers is a story of endurance, courage and tremendous inner strength."

"I am honoured to have been selected as the recipient of this award," Bhardwaj said in her acceptance speech, which was shot on location.

At the same ceremony, Ajit Balakrishnan, publisher of India Abroad , presented Vanita Gupta with the Publisher's Special Award for Outstanding Achievement.

The announcement was made by Microsoft India top boss, chairman Ravi Venkatesan. The present MD Rajiv Kaul has been promoted to a key role as senior director – Windows Client Emerging Markets Group - and will soon be moving to Microsoft's Redmond headquarters.

Microsoft India is among the very few top firms, and not just infotech entities, to have appointed a woman in the top professional slot. It is a rare occurrence even for Microsoft to have a woman leading its crucial subsidiary in a key geography. What is even more creditable is that Dhawan has served in India for last two decades.

Dhawan will be incharge of the IT behemoth's sales and marketing efforts in India. She will be responsible for growing Microsoft's products and services businesses and also play a key role in driving the company's partnerships and strategic alliances.

Known to be aggressive and a go-getter, Dhawan has been in the IT hardware industry for 22 years and has risen from the ranks.

Before joining Microsoft, she was serving as vice president, Customer Solutions Group, HP India, with a focus on enterprise, public sector and SMB sectors for all computing products and services. She was also responsible for strategic alliances and partner relationships. Prior to joining HP in 1999, Dhawan had served IBM and HCL.

"Neelam Dhawan is highly respected in the industry and has an excellent track record of managing customer and partner relationships. She brings an exceptional understanding of the changing needs of customers and partners and a wealth of experience in delivering solutions," said Ravi Venkatesan.

"I am excited with the opportunity to lead Microsoft India at a very interesting time and look forward to combining my experience with the unique depth of technology and resources of Microsoft to drive customer success," commented Dhawan on her appointment.

Meera Syal was born in 1963 near Wolverhampton in the West Midlands. Aware of her racial difference from an early age, Syal is proud of her Indian roots and culture. She was educated at Manchester University where she read English and Drama. In the final year of her drama degree, she co-wrote and performed in the play One of Us, which won the National Student Drama Award.

Since then Syal tried her best to combine writing and acting as her career. Today, apart from being an accomplished novelist she is also known for her acting work on radio and television, notably Goodness Gracious Me and The Kumars at No 42 .

At the age of 36, she wrote her first novel capsulating her childhood experiences of growing up in a small mining community. The novel, Anita and Me (1996) was shortlisted for the Guardian Fiction Prize and won a Betty Trask Award. Life Isn't All Ha Ha Hee Hee (1999) is her second novel.

Syal also wrote the script for Gurinder Chadha's Bhaji on the Beach , a film that portrays a Birmingham-based South Asian women's collective and their day-trip to Blackpool.

Year of Birth:	1963
	Nationality:	British
	Parents:	Syal's parents emigrated to Britain from New Delhi in 1961
	Education:	Read English and Drama at Manchester University
	Profession:	Writer & Actress
	Achievements
	1997:	Awarded MBE
	2000:	'Media Personality of the Year' Award at the annual Race in the Media Awards
	2001:	EMMA Award for being the media personality of the year

Parminder Nagra, the girl who made it big and got popular from Bend it Like Beckham , is a Sikh, Punjabi girl born and brought up in England.

Her family moved from India to England in the 1960s. She was born and raised in Leicester, and has a younger sister and two younger brothers. Her parents divorced when she was young. Her biological father is a foundry worker, stepfather is a book keeper for his cousin's transport business, and her mother works as a packer in a factory.

Parminder has had no formal acting training. In education apart from completing "A" levels, Nagra has done GCSEs in music and drama at Soar Valley Community College, Leicester.

Her family supported her to become a professional actress when she was 17 years old. She started acting mostly in theater and television productions.

She came to the limelight in the 2002 movie Bend It Like Beckham where she starred as Jesminder 'Jess' Bhamra. She worked hard to fit into Jess' role and practiced with England's only pro girls soccer team to prepare for the role. The film was a box office hit in both the United States and United Kingdom.

Nagra can speak fluent Punjabi and a bit of Hindi. Holly Hunter, Jodie Foster and Edward Norton are her role models in acting.

Name:	Parminder Kaur Nagra
	Date of Birth:	October 5, 1975
	Place of birth:	Leicester, England
	Nationality:	British
	Parents:	Her parents moved to the UK in 1960s. Her father is a bookkeeper and her mother works in a factory.
	Achievements
	2002:	Bordeaux International Festival of Women in Cinema's Golden Wave Award for Best Actress for Bend it Like Beckham
	2002:	Won Presidential Award
	2002:	Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA)'s International Football Personality of the Year
	2004:	Movieline Young Hollywood Award for Breakthrough Performance by a Female for Bend It Like Beckham
	2004:	Won Ethnic Multicultural Media Academy (EMMA) Award for Best Actress (Television) for 'Second Generation'

Amina Cachalia - Struggle for freedom

Amina Cachalia born in 1930 and was the seventh child of EI Asvat, was an activist from Mahatma Gandhi's time. Her family moved from Vereeniging to New Clare where her mother owned property. Amina went to an Indian School and there she was exposed to politics. She was very much influenced by Mervy Thandray, a teacher who belonged to the Communist Party and took it upon himself to develop the awareness of his students about conditions in South Africa.

She remained in Durban until the campaign ended late in 1947, but she was never allowed to take part. She returned to Fordsburg and decided not to continue with formal education. Instead she took up shorthand and typing, found a job and became politically active. She joined the Indian Youth Congress and attended classes conducted by members of the TIC to learn about the situation in South Africa and ways to overcome injustice.

She worked for the Peace Council for a while, raising funds and organising meetings. She also became very involved in Congress work and meeting people working at the Industrial Council. In 1948, she established the Women's Progressive Union that worked hand-in-hand with the Institute of Race Relations. Her aim was to assist women to become financially independent.

For participating in the political movement she was banned from 1963 to 1980. After her banning ended she involved herself in the strugle against government's efforts to co-opt Indian and other communities present in the country. She was an ANC candidate elect for the National Assembly after the first democratic elections in South Africa.

For her services she was honoured by President Abdul Kalam at the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas 2005.

Srinija Srinivasan - Yahoo!s back end

Srinija Srinivasan hold a B.S degree from Stanford University in Symbolic Systems and passed out with distinction. She conducted course work in Japan and is proficient both in written and spoken Japanese. Apart from this her professional and academic accomplishments inlucde summer intensive in Japan as researcher and programmer for Fujitsu Laboratories.

She published research papers in highly-acclaimed journals including Government Information Quarterly and the Journal of Technology Transfer . Srinija has appeared in top publications both locally and nationally, including The New York Times and Fortune , was named one of "The Net 50" by Newsweek , and was selected as one of the "40 Under 40" by San Francisco Focus for their second-annual brain trust.

Prior to joining Yahoo! as the company's fifth employee, Srinija Srinivasan was involved with the Cyc Project, a ten-year artificial intelligence effort to build an immense database of human commonsense knowledge, via two companies: Microelectronics and Computer Technology Corporation (MCC) and Cycorp. At Cycorp, Srinivasan independently managed the company's California-based office, and helped develop the Cyc technology into innovative areas such as database browsing and integration.

Srinija manages Yahoo! Inc's team of Surfers and is responsible for the design and maintenance of Yahoo!'s overall classification and organization scheme, the foundation stones of Yahoo's system. 

Anita Talwar is one of the few women of Indian origin who have achieved what they dreamt of. She emigrated from India to US with plans of setting up her own business. She initially started working as a junior consultant and gradually progressed to become Director of Accounting and Contracts. She exploited this knowledge and experience to start Advanced Management Technology Inc (AMTI) in 1987. AMTI provides both management and technical support to Federal and Commercial markets.

AMTI's first major pushup contract was with Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in 1992. Then from there onwards there is no looking back, AMTI has proved their performance through this contract. In the intervening years, AMTI has supported virtually every DOT operating administration. It has also branched out to provide services to a number of other government agencies, including the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Department of Treasury, and the U.S. Army, Navy, and Air Force.

AMTI with its headquarters in Arlington, Virginia has 380 employees in 11 offices spread across US. The core competencies of the company include information systems management, Internet/intranet development, multimedia product design and distribution, system engineering, and aviation services.

AMTI got the recognition as the number two woman-owned business in the Washington, DC area by the Washington Business Journal Book of Lists. It also received one of DOT's 2002 Disadvantaged Business Entrepreneur Awards, which was presented by Secretary Mineta. Appropriately, AMTI received this award for its service to FAA - the operating administration that "gave AMTI the opportunity" by awarding the firm its first government contract.

The Washington Business Journal listed it as the ‘Largest Woman-Owned IT Services Firm' in the D.C. Metro area in 2001. It was also ranked 232nd in the list of ‘Top 500 Women-Owned Businesses in the United States' by Working Woman magazine in 2001.

Purva Bedi , an Indian American is earning fame and name among the huge bank of Indian American community in the U S A and elsewhere with her fine and spirited performance in the recently released movie > American Desi, a movie which has been acclaimed as a movie with a difference since it comes as a combined effort of the community in the U S A. The movie has gone down well with the Indian American community and has swept the box office counters in the U S A and is all set to be released in the U K and Bedi's country of origin India AND THE major person who is earning rave encomiums is none other than the petite and pretty Purva Bedi.

A lady with lots of verve and vivacity, she has completely bowled over the audiences with her down to earth performance and looks all set to spread her name outside the well-entrenched community of Indian Americans. The movie is the idea of writer-director Piyush Dinker Pandya and has raked in the dollars and acclaim for the entire cast of the film and none more so than the lady PURVA BEDI .

Her career story goes as follows > She is a well known actress in various platforms of acting – films, theatres and television, has appeared in several prominent roles in well known serials such as Kaytha Trask on NBC's Emmy award winning drama The West Wing and on the season premiere of ER playing Priya Shailendra, an eager medical student on the first day of ER rotations at County General Hospital.

Vani Kola, B2B QUEEN

Where do determined entrepreneurs go to get information about setting up a software company? In Vani Kola's case the answer was surprisingly simple and logical -- the public library in Sunnyvale.

Obviously, the future CEO of RightWorks in San Jose, California picked the right reading material because three years after her visit to the library in 1995, she has accumulated $ 25 million in capital and sells her product corporate purchasing systems at $ 250,000 and up.

For Kola, who is in her mid 30s, the journey from Hyderabad, India to the US had few glitches. A happy, secure childhood gave her confidence to go after her dreams. A straight student, she graduated in electrical engineering in the top ten at Osmania University.

Supreme self-confidence, staying a step ahead of the competition, and galvanizing others around her vision come naturally to Kola, who never missed a debating challenge in high school and college in her hometown of Hyderabad, India.

Vani and Srinivas Kola had an arranged marriage, but the families had been friends for many years. In 1985, they came to Arizona State University for graduate studies.

Both graduated in electrical engineers. Her husband, 39, is now a consultant for Cisco Systems. While he went on to doing his Ph D, Vani held engineering and technical management positions at Consilium and Empros.

At Consilium she was responsible for building a scheduling system used by the pharmaceutical industry for manufacturing and inventory control. At Empros, a division of the Control Data Corporation, she was responsible for building a real-time software application for the management of power generation and transmission by electric utilities

Kola realized a few years ago that the growing Web enterprise computing was ready for a revolution and that she could build heavy duty corporate computing systems.

After her research at the library and writing a business plan, she graduated to the next step: raising money. It proved to be easy. Investors and engineers from prominent companies like Cisco and Silicon Graphics listened to her and gave advice, encouragement and support.

Among the first to show interest in her ideas was Prabhu Goel, one of the most successful of Indian venture capitalists in Silicon Valley.

She met him at an event connected with an education program in India started by Goel with his $ 10 million. Introducing herself after the event and following up with phone calls, she impressed Goel.

Dr Suhas Patil, yet another successful entrepreneur and VC in the valley, backed her up with about $ 2 million of his money,

Kola was on a roll. She and her staff honed her Web-based technology from start to finish corporate systems and made her pitch, successfully to Fujitsu's US computer corporate procurement systems.

There was a major setback: Kola's product turned out to be incompatible with another key system already at use at Fujitsu. The deal fell through, but 45 days later, she was back, this time with a new, improved version of her product that fitted in and worked perfectly with the company's operating system.

Today, RightWorks is headquartered in San Jose and maintains sales offices in Atlanta, Calgary, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, New York, Toronto and Washington DC.

RightWorks offers a software solution for purchasing professionals. It is a web-based procurement package that allows purchasing departments to negotiate the best deals with suppliers and streamlines the order and approval process. The result is saved time and money and no more chasing paper trails.

The software developed by RightWorks allows companies in their own Net marketplaces to communicate with two of the largest B2B e-markets, Ariba Inc. and Commerce One, which allow buyers and sellers to meet online for transactions.

A private company, RightWorks does not release information on its revenue and the number of its employees.

The real secret to Kola's success is her focus and her never-give-up philosophy. Being smart and savvy has also been a plus in advertising her company and communicating with executives. For example, Kola sent Fortune 500 CEOs a product pitch printed on oversize cardboard that no one could throw away -- it was too big and too hard to crumble.

She was pregnant with her second child when it was time for a scheduled print advertisement campaign. She posed for the pictures. She took the newborn to the East Coast when she demonstrated her product to companies.

One thing Kola was absolutely sure would never work: running the company with her husband as co-partner. Like other working women, Kola balances both home and work. And if there are events that conflict in her two worlds, she has her own way of resolving it. Vani and her husband, Srinivas Kola, have two daughters: Tara, 6 and Sandya, nearly 2.

She sold a 53-percent stake to e-commerce investment firm, Internet Capital Group (ICG), for $657 million.She received $22 million in cash and about $635 million in stock. The deal valued the company at about $1.25 billion. Kola, says she's shooting for $10 billion or $20 billion with the help of Internet Capital Group Inc.

In August 2000, Kola left to co-found an incubator to start next-generation business-to-business technology companies. Many supporters expect her next venture to flourish as well.

Those around Kola credit her with an uncanny knack for identifying new ideas and implementing them. Dubbed NthOrbit, the new company has an ambitious and different model than other incubators. NthOrbit will create the companies, support the technology development, and provide management expertise, as well as critical seed funding.

NthOrbit's first three ventures include supply-chain software that lets manufacturing departments order across multiple enterprises in real time, a wireless application for real-time routing and scheduling, and automated payment systems.

With her entrepreneurial spirit flourishing once again, Kola is looking forward to her next mountain-climbing adventure as well as her expedition to secure venture-capital funding for her new company. Neither feat is guaranteed, but given Kola's track record, there's a good chance she'll succeed on both counts.

Her advice to young entrepreneurs: Be what you want. Chase your dreams. Only you know what you want and what you are willing to settle for.

Kola believes her success was a combination of timing, enterprise and determination.

-----------Source - HindustanTimes.com, India Times , Indo-Asian News Service ,namastenri.com