Three Indians in 100 women bankers' list

Women are scarce in top echelons of domestic banks, except for a few like ICICI Bank, but the fairer-sex bankers of Indian origin are making it big in the West with three of them being named among 100 most powerful women in the European financial world.

Julie Chakraverty, the youngest managing director and a board member at Swiss banking giant UBS; Ina De, Europe head of new equity issues at JPMorgan; and Rita Dhut, head of value investments at leading UK fund manager Morley Fund Management have been named among the Europe's most influential bankers by the Financial News weekly in its "FN-100 Women" list.

This is despite banking and financial sectors being long considered as a men's territory in India as well as abroad.

In India, there are just about half a dozen women bankers holding top management level positions across various banks, with the country's biggest private sector lender ICICI Bank accounting for more than half of them.

Chanda Kochhar was recently promoted as joint managing director at ICICI bank and is being tipped as the next CEO after K V Kamath retires next year.

Besides, the bank has Vishakha Mulye as executive director of ICICI General Insurance business, Renuka Ramnath as chief of ICICI Ventures and Shikha Sharma heading its life insurance business.