4 Indian-Americans on TIME100 NEXT List; Here’s Who They Are

Meet the Indian Americans on TIME100NEXT list.

(Photo: Shruti Mathur/The Quint)

The 2021 TIME100 Next, an extension the TIME Group's flagship TIME100 list of the most influential people in the world, saw four Indian-Americans make it to the list. This includes Instacart Founder Apoorva Mehta and Twitter's Vijay Gadde.

The TIME100 Next is a list of the 100 top emerging leaders in the world who will "shape the future". Here's a look at all the Indian-Americans who made it to this year's list.

1. Apoorva Mehta

Instacart Founder, Apoorva Mehta.

(Photo: File)

Apoorva Mehta is the 34-year-old owner and founder of Instacart, an American grocery delivery firm, which started in 2012.

The San Francisco-based startup announced on 11 June 2020 that it had raised $225 million in a new funding round, catapulting its valuation from $7.9 billion to $13.7 billion, reports Forbes.

Forbes estimates that Mehta owns a 10 percent stake in the organisation, taking his networth to $1.2 billion.

During the COVD-19 pandemic, Instacart “faced a tidal wave of orders, as people with means opted en masse to pay the service’s workers to buy groceries for them.” Mehta describes that period as a “wartime moment”, said TIME’s profile on the startup founder.

2. Vijaya Gadde

Twitter executive VijayaGadde.

(Photo: File)

Vijaya Gadde is Twitter's top lawyer and policy executive.

At, 46, Gadde is "one of the most powerful executives" in the company, said TIME.

She was the architect of Twitter's 2019 decision to ban all political advertising, and is responsible for the warning labels that Twitter applied to COVID-19 and election-interference misinformation in 2020.

"While Twitter is still home to much misinformation and harassment, Gadde’s influence is slowly turning the company into one that sees free speech not as sacrosanct, but as just one human right among many that need to be weighed against one another,” said the TIME profile.

She was reportedly the one to convey the news to CEO Jack Dorsey that President Donald Trump’s Twitter account had been suspended following the attack on Capitol Hill on 6 January.

3. Dr Shikha Gupta

DrShikha Gupta

(Photo: TIME)

Shikha Gupta is an India-American doctor and Executive Director of US-based nonprofit Get Us PPE.

TIME said that Gupta "stepped up to meet the growing demand for personal protective equipment for healthcare professionals at a time when there was a 'leadership vacuum' from the White House."

“In a crisis, small acts can make a big impact. And in extraordinary times, ordinary people, driven by service, can do extraordinary things. The early days of the COVID-19 pandemic were some of the darkest in America’s history. A leadership vacuum from the White House contributed to health care professionals across the country lacking the personal protective equipment they needed to stay safe and save lives,” it said.

The Get US PPE organisation has helped distribute more than 6.5 million pieces of PPE to frontline workers in the US.

4. Rohan Pavuluri

Upsolve founder Rohan Pavuluri.

(Photo: File)

Rohan Pavuluri is the 25-year-old founder of the free online tool called Upsolve that helps users fill out bankruptcy forms on their own.

TIME said that as the COVID-19 pandemic brought varied economic hardships to Americans, filing for personal bankruptcy was seen as an effective way to eliminate debt but entailed high legal costs and complex paperwork.

Pavuluri's Upsolve has till date "helped American users relieve more than USD 300 million in debt,” the TIME profile said.