The cookie rumbles: Vinita Bali

In the past five years, Vinita Bali has more than doubled revenues at Britannia Industries, the Bangalore-based biscuits-tobreads company, from Rs 1,500 crore to Rs 3,800 crore. The firm's nascent dairy business has quadrupled in size and she has also doubled the bakery business through a series of acquisitions, product innovations and aggressive marketing.

Biggest achievement in 2010: Creation of Britannia Nutrition Foundation Being a powerful woman is important because: You can be impactful within and outside business. Impact, rather than power, is key Tip for work-life balance: Have fun at work, don't let it become a burden on you A workplace without women is like: A sky without stars

This growth hasn't come easy. Bali has had to deal with rising commodity prices and increasingly aggressive competition, especially from Parle Products, which has held a sizeable lead in glucose biscuits, and reportedly is in first place in the overall biscuits market, too. More than market share, however, Bali's focus is now on improving profitability. However, it isn't just business that has held Bali's attention recently. Rather, it is the formation of the Britannia Nutrition Foundation, which supports research and development of nutrition in different food categories.

Britannia has internally been fortifying its biscuits with additional nutrients, but Bali believes that this movement can be more widespread. "People used to go on asking us what our CSR plans were," says Bali, adding, "We have no skill in building a school, but we do know about food."
-Rahul Sachitanand

The 30 Most Powerful Women
1. Schauna Chauhan 2. Zarin Daruwala 3. Lynn de Souza 4. Tanya Dubash 5. Shyamala Gopinath 6. Vinita Gupta 7. Kaku Nakhate 8. Vedika Bhandarkar 9. Manisha Girotra 10. Lalita Gupte 11. Usha Narayanan 12. Akhila Srinivasan 13. Leena Nair 14. Vinita Bali 15. Chanda Kochhar	16. Roopa Kudva 17. Naina Lal Kidwai 18. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw 19. Zarina Mehta 20. Zia Mody 21. Kalpana Morparia 22. Vishakha Mulye 23. Swati Piramal 24. Meher Pudumjee 25. Madhabi Puri Buch 26. Chitra Ramkrishna 27. Preetha Reddy 28. Shikha Sharma 29. Mallika Srinivasan 30. Sangeeta Talwar