India's Women Entrepreneurs Just Won ₹28,000 Crore From the Government — And Most People Haven't Noticed
While the startup world talks about Series A rounds and unicorn valuations, something quietly historic is happening in a corner of India's economy that rarely makes front pages. Over 2.1 lakh women-led enterprises have registered on the Government e-Marketplace — known as GeM — and in FY 2025-26, they walked away with contracts exceeding ₹28,000 crore. That's a 28% jump from the previous year. And it's only getting started.
This is not charity. This is not a quota system producing token results. This is Indian women — running micro and small enterprises across cities, towns, and villages — competing on a transparent digital platform, winning government contracts on merit, and building businesses that last.
What Is GeM — And Why It Changes Everything
The Government e-Marketplace was launched in 2016 with a deceptively simple idea: move all government procurement online, make it transparent, and remove the middlemen who had historically made it nearly impossible for small businesses — especially women-led ones — to access government contracts.
Before GeM, securing a government contract required navigating a labyrinth of bureaucracy, personal connections, and opaque tendering processes that systematically favoured large, established vendors. A woman entrepreneur running a textile enterprise in Rajasthan or a packaging business in Tamil Nadu had virtually no shot at competing for government business — not because her product was inferior, but because the system wasn't built for her.
GeM demolished that barrier. On GeM, pricing is visible to everyone. Products are compared openly. Orders are placed digitally. And a small women-led enterprise in tier-3 India competes on exactly the same footing as a large corporate supplier. The biggest advantage of GeM is transparency — and transparency, it turns out, is the single most powerful tool for women entrepreneurs.
The Numbers That Tell the Story
As of FY 2025-26, the platform has achieved a cumulative Gross Merchandise Value of ₹18.4 lakh crore — including ₹5 lakh crore in the financial year alone. More than 25 lakh sellers are now registered, with nearly 72% being micro and small enterprises.
Within that ecosystem, women-led businesses have become a force that can no longer be ignored. Over 2.1 lakh women-led MSEs are registered on GeM — up significantly from earlier years — and they secured orders exceeding ₹28,000 crore in FY26, registering approximately 28% growth year-on-year. To put that in perspective: that's ₹28,000 crore flowing directly into women-owned businesses from government procurement — no intermediary, no gatekeeping, no old boys' network required.
GeM CEO Mihir Kumar said it plainly: the platform promotes economic inclusion, sustainability, and transparency in public spending — and the women-led enterprise numbers are proof that inclusion, when built into infrastructure rather than left to goodwill, actually works.
The Womaniya Initiative — A Special Gateway
Inside GeM sits a dedicated programme called the Womaniya Initiative — a special framework that directly connects women-led micro and small enterprises and Self-Help Groups to the government marketplace. It removes the complexity of registration, provides dedicated support, and ensures that women entrepreneurs aren't just theoretically welcome on the platform — they're actively brought into it.
The results speak for themselves. Since its launch, the Womaniya Initiative has helped cross-platform orders to women-led enterprises surpass ₹80,000 crore cumulatively. At the 7th anniversary celebration in January 2026, GeM CEO Mihir Kumar emphasized that women-led enterprises can grow their businesses more effectively by understanding the dynamics of government procurement — and the platform is making that understanding accessible.
Beyond Women — A Platform Lifting Everyone
The women-led enterprise story is part of a broader picture of inclusion that GeM is driving across India's economy. SC/ST enterprises secured orders worth over ₹6,000 crore in FY26 — also registering approximately 28% growth. Startups on the platform secured orders worth over ₹19,000 crore, marking the highest year-on-year increase of all groups at 36%.
State government procurement on GeM grew 38.3% in FY26 — meaning the platform is no longer just a central government tool. It's becoming the backbone of procurement across India's entire government machinery, from central ministries and public sector enterprises to state governments and union territories.
Why This Matters for India's Women Empowerment Story
The global conversation about women's economic empowerment tends to focus on venture capital — who's funding women founders, how much, and whether the numbers are improving. That conversation is important. But it reaches a narrow slice of women entrepreneurs at the very top of the pyramid.
GeM's impact reaches far deeper. The 2.1 lakh women-led enterprises winning contracts on GeM are not VC-backed startups chasing unicorn status. They are manufacturers, artisans, service providers, and traders — running real businesses, employing real people, and building real economic security for themselves and their families.
When a government platform is designed with genuine inclusion at its core — not as a side feature, not as a CSR initiative, but as fundamental architecture — this is what results look like. ₹28,000 crore. 2.1 lakh enterprises. 28% growth. Year after year.
India's women entrepreneurs didn't need someone to believe in them. They needed a fair platform to compete on. GeM gave them that — and they've done the rest themselves.
