India’s AI Workforce Has a Gender Blind Spot

India’s digital economy is accelerating at an ever-increasing pace, contributing 11.7 percent to the country’s GDP and projected to cross 20 percent by 2030. Yet, a new report released at Charcha 2025, titled “Decoded: Women and the Future of Digital Work in India,” warns that women remain critically underrepresented in this transformation.

Against this backdrop,  many voices are pushing for a fundamental reimagining of who gets to shape India’s digital present and its AI-driven future.

Over the past decade, the definition of “women in tech” has broadened far beyond its original scope. According to Brenda Darden Wilkerson, Global President & CEO of AnitaB.org, the term encompasses builders, thinkers, policymakers, ethicists, product architects, community designers, and everyone shaping the future of technology.

The rising societal influence of AI drives this evolution. “A decade ago, women were calling out risks but not being heard,” Wilkerson adds. “Today, their voices are essential because tech built without the populations it serves becomes unsafe, biased, and exclusionary.”

For India, this shift is even more pronounced. Shreya Krishnan, Managing Director–India at AnitaB.org, says that the identity has evolved far beyond engineers in IT services. “Women working on grassroots digital innovation, on vernacular research, on designing apps for Bharat users, they are all women in tech,” she says. 

Technology is no longer a domain; it is an ecosystem.

Who Belongs in the Tech Workforce Today?

Both leaders argue that every role influencing the design, deployment, or governance of technology must be recognized as part of the tech landscape.

Whether it’s a woman annotating localized datasets in a rural district, a researcher studying safe digital experiences for teenagers, or a policy expert drafting AI regulations, they all belong to the ecosystem. “Technology touches every part of human life,” Wilkerson says. “So women contributing to societal, behavioral, and equity frameworks are women in tech.” 

Despite decades of initiatives and formal commitments, women remain underrepresented in the technology sector, particularly at senior leadership levels. Wilkerson attributes this to deeper structural resistance.

“The systems that gatekeep power haven’t changed,” she said. Women’s expertise, particularly in risk and ethics, is often dismissed because it slows down profit-driven trajectories. She recalls instances where women researchers were replaced by men simply because their findings were “too complicated.”

Krishnan highlights the persistence of the “boys’ club,” where informal networks and cultural biases influence opportunities and advancement. Microaggressions, a pressure to “fit in,” exclusion from strategic conversations, and opaque promotion norms all contribute to women’s burnout and attrition.

Surveys also show that women frequently experience workplace microaggressions, such as being interrupted in meetings or stereotyped, which subtly undermine their voice and confidence. Opaque promotion criteria and limited access to informal strategic conversations further narrow leadership pathways. 

McKinsey data reveal that for every 100 men promoted to manager roles, substantially fewer women make the same advance, creating a “broken rung” that compounds over time. As these patterns accumulate, they contribute to attrition. 

Where Women Drop Off

In India and globally, women’s representation declines sharply as career level rises, underscoring structural barriers rather than a pipeline problem. Women account for around 31–34 % of entry-level tech roles, but far fewer senior and leadership positions, such as C-suite or director roles. 

Women at mid-career levels are significantly more likely than men to face discouraging work climates and leave the sector altogether, which deepens representation gaps when diversity efforts fall short of addressing culture and advancement practices. 

Women account for a significant share of junior roles in tech, with female participation reaching 38.3% in GCCs in 2024, yet representation drops sharply at higher levels. In the IT services sector, women’s presence in mid-level roles increased from 4.13% in 2020 to just 8.93% in 2024, highlighting how gender diversity thins as seniority rises rather than reflecting a lack of entry-level talent. 

This mid-career drop-off is driven by a combination of mobility constraints, caregiving responsibilities, cultural expectations, and biased leadership evaluations, which disproportionately affect women in their 30s and 40s. Industry reports note that rising attrition among mid-career women, in most cases surpassing that of men, is linked to inflexible return-to-office mandates and limited access to supportive work arrangements. 

Even as women’s participation in contractual and junior tech roles rose sharply, from 9.5% in 2020 to nearly 28% in 2024, this growth has not translated into leadership representation, underscoring persistent structural barriers in promotion, evaluation, and career progression.

Retention and leadership gaps are the most concerning. The senior-most levels, where decisions on AI strategy, data governance, and product safety are made, remain the least diverse. “This is where representation is most critical,” Wilkerson says.

Compounding this is the new risk that AI will replace entry-level jobs, which could disrupt future talent pipelines.

Both leaders agree that genuine inclusion requires redesigning systems, rather than asking women to adapt. Safe workplaces, unbiased performance metrics, flexible policies, transparent promotion pathways, and accountability tied to outcomes, not optics, are essential.

“If diverse teams had built the internet from the start, it would be a radically safer place today,” Krishnan says. Diversity shouldn’t be a checkbox; it should influence product decisions, risk frameworks, and digital safety norms.

Wilkerson identifies women-centric forums such as the Grace Hopper Celebration India (GHCI) as influential precisely because of women’s historical exclusion from mainstream tech spaces, noting that they center women’s expertise while creating “visibility pipelines” to employment, collaboration, mentorship, and leadership.

Arguments that women-only events create separation overlook a fundamental reality: male-centric events rarely face the same scrutiny. Reports highlight that tech conferences are often perceived as male-oriented spaces, where women are frequently the only females on stage and may feel marginalized, which can deter participation and diminish their professional visibility.

Multiple audits of major technology conferences have revealed stark gender disparities. From 2016 to 2018, women comprised only about 25–31% of all keynote and standalone speakers. Some high-profile events had zero female keynote speakers in a given year, reflecting deeply male-centric lineups at flagship industry gatherings rather than inclusivity.

AI Era Demands Women’s Leadership?

As India enters an AI-first era, organizations like AnitaB.org are becoming more crucial than ever.

“AI magnifies inequality if built without diverse voices,” Wilkerson says. The organization plans to expand its reach into underserved communities, ensuring women everywhere can participate in and influence the future.

The message is clear: India’s digital economy cannot afford to leave women behind. If the next decade of technological growth is to be safe, inclusive, and equitable, women must not only participate in tech but also lead it.