The Martha Farrell Award for Excellence in Women’s Empowerment and Gender Equality is a first-of-its-kind initiative to discover, recognise, and honor mid-career individuals and committed institutions which have made valuable contributions in the areas of women’s empowerment, gender equality, and living feminism in their everyday lives and practices.

The Award offers nominees and winners a platform to grow and network with like-minded professionals and institutions working in the space of gender empowerment and equality. Winners also receive a prize money component of INR 1,50,000 each.

Nomination forms

Award Categories

Most Promising Individual

Who can apply:

  • Professionals of any gender, between ages 25 and 40 years, working in government, business, industry, or civil society organisations in India.
  • The person has worked consistently for at least the past five years to promote women’s empowerment or gender equality within the workplace, at home, in communities, in educational institutions, in society, etc.
  • Innovative, practical,and comprehensive  approaches to social change promoting women’s empowerment or gender equality.
  • Personal examples and role models who practice values of feminism in everyday life.

Best Organisation for Gender Equality

Who can apply:

  • Any organisation or department/center/campaign under it, including government, business, industry, educational, health, media, unions, federations, or civil society, registered in India.
  • The organisation has been actively implementing systems/practices/strategies to mainstream gender both externally and internally - not just limited to program implementation but also working towards creating a gender-sensitive and gender-equal environment within their own workplace. Such efforts have been consistent for at least five years.
  • Innovative, practical, and comprehensive approaches to cultural and political change within the organisation toward women’s empowerment or gender equality.
MFA criteria (Hindi)

Most Promising Individual

Archana KR

Archana K.R. is a social activist from Karnataka whose lived experiences of inadequate sanitation and hygiene drive her commitment to advancing sanitation, menstrual hygiene, and gender justice for Dalit, Adivasi, and transgender communities. As the founder of Stand4SHE, she leads grassroots and policy initiatives transforming civic infrastructure and empowering leaders from marginalised groups. Her work challenges systemic inequalities in Karnataka’s urban slums and influences state policies. Through her persistent advocacy, the government allocated 100 crore for the maintenance of school toilets across 49,000 state-run schools, improving access to safe sanitation for countless children.

Best Organisation for Gender Equality

Rural Women Development Trust (RWDT)

Rural Women Development Trust (RWDT), founded in 2005 in Salem, Tamil Nadu, empowers Dalit Arunthathiyar communities through education, rehabilitation, and collective action. The organisation has rescued 2,896 families, including 380 children, from bonded labour and connected 10,500 women through the Arunthathiyar Women’s Liberation Movement across 23 districts. Using participatory tools like songs, theatre, and art, RWDT promotes pride in Arunthathiyar identity and awareness of rights. Over 15,000 children have received education and nutrition support, and 4,000+ women workers have secured social protection, advancing dignity, equality, and justice for marginalised communities.

Special Jury - Organisation

Ekal Nari Shakti Sangathan

From a small group of 105 single women in 2005 to a powerful collective of 19,445 women today, ENSS fights for the rights and inclusion of widows, divorced women, dalit, muslim, women with disabilities and unmarried women across caste and religion. Their sustained advocacy and unique methods of padyatra, dharnas, street theatre, folk dance and music have led to policy reforms for single women, and massive socio-political participation with 253 single women elected in panchayat elections by 2020, making Himachal Pradesh one of the leading states in having policies inclusive of the most vulnerable sections.

Special Jury - Individual

Jayanti Bururda

Jayanti Buruda is a journalist and social activist from the Koya tribe of Malkangiri. She has spent nine years advancing menstrual health, gender rights, and community empowerment across 20 villages of rural and tribal Odisha. As the founder of Bada Didi, a volunteer network that amplifies tribal women’s voices and the community’s forest rights. She has trained over 150 community leaders from 14 tribal communities on the Forest Rights Act (FRA) of 2006, supported 2,500 women with health and education training, and has directly aided 60 girls financially. She is transforming personal struggles into grassroots change in rural Odisha. 

Find out more about previous winners

Namgail Angmo

Tanya Khera

Dr. Kavita Namdeo Ware

Association for Advocacy and Legal Initiatives Trust

Breakthrough Trust

Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee

Moitri Sanjog Society

Sutanutir Sakhya

Jury

Dr. Bhavani Rao

AMMACHI Labs and the Center for Women's Empowerment and Gender Equality

Read about them

 

Dr. Bhavani Rao

Dr. Bhavani Rao is the dean of the School of Social and Behavioural Sciences at Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham. She is also the director of AMMACHI Labs and the Center for Women’s Empowerment and Gender Equality. She has held India’s UNESCO Chair in Gender Equality since 2016, and served as the coordinator of the Gender Equality & Women's Empowerment Working Group of Civil20, a G20 civil society Engagement Group. Her work is centered on empowering women in rural areas.

Deep Jyoti Sonu Brahma

Founder Director of Farm2Food Foundation

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Deep Jyoti Sonu Brahma

Deep Jyoti Sonu Brahma is the founder director of Farm2Food Foundation, which focuses on mainstreaming agriculture as an aspirational livelihood for vulnerable youth in Assam. He works in the areas of education, climate change, and coalition building. Brahma is on the advisory governance team at Vartaleap, Catalyst2030 NAISE and several other social enterprises. He has been actively engaging and mentoring women social entrepreneurs and women-led farmer producer companies in the Northeast region.

Feisal Alkazi

Theatre Director

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Feisal Alkazi

Feisal Alkazi is a renowned theatre director and documentary maker, having directed over 300 plays for adults and children and 30 documentaries, many of them on children with special needs. He has been a counsellor and trainer with Sanjivini for over 35 years. He was also a master trainer in HIV/AIDS prevention for the UN from 2002-07. After completing his MSW, Alkazi headed Ankur, Society for Alternatives in Education, for 10 years, where Martha was a prominent staff member. When he left to start Creative Learning for Change, Martha joined him as one of the founders. For several years they worked as colleagues in the arenas of gender sensitisation, environment education and alternative education. They co-authored several books including Gender on the Agenda, Chipko, Nainas Village, among others.

Mirai Chatterjee

Director of SEWA's Social Security team

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Mirai Chatterjee

Mirai Chatterjee is the director of SEWA's Social Security team and the chairperson of its Cooperative Federation of 110 informal women workers’ cooperatives; she has previously also served as the organisation’s general secretary. Chatterjee is the chairperson of the global informal workers and policymakers network, Women in Informal Employment Globalising and Organising, and is on the board of the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship. She was a commissioner in the World Health Organization’s Commission on the Social Determinants of Health and a member of the High-Level Expert Group on Universal Health Coverage set up by the Planning Commission of India in 2010.

Dr. Rajesh Tandon

Founder - President of Participatory Research in Asia | Chairperson of MFF

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Dr. Rajesh Tandon

Dr Rajesh Tandon is the founder-president of Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA) and the chairperson of Martha Farrell Foundation. He is also the co-chair of UNESCO Chair on Community Based Research and Social Responsibility in Higher Education since 2012.

A pioneer of participatory research, Tandon has given new meaning to academic research by redefining the relationship between the researcher and the researched. He has also served on numerous expert committees of the Government of India, University Grants Commission, United Nations, Commonwealth and World Bank. In 2015, the Indian Adult Education Association (IAEA) awarded Tandon the Nehru Literacy Award. For his distinguished work on gender issues, the Government of India honoured him with the prestigious Award in Social Justice in 2007.

Sudha Srinivasan

Chief Executive Officer of Centre for Social Innovation

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Sudha Srinivasan

Sudha Srinivasan is the chief executive officer of Centre for Social Innovation, The/Nudge Institute, where she leads initiatives to create a thriving livelihood ecosystem. She currently serves on the Agri-Startup Advisory Group, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare, Government of India. An engineer by training, she previously worked at Intel and completed her MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow. 

Partners

  • PRIA