Our Team

Saba
Saba Khalid is an award-winning social entrepreneur, public speaker, activist and journalist from Karachi, Pakistan. Having worked with digital, print and television, she founded Aurat Raaj, a women empowerment, education and entertainment platform that uses digital technologies in 2017. She is behind its key product “RAAJI”, a chatbot that educates girls on taboo health, safety and hygiene topics such as menstruation, pregnancy, STDs and consent. Raaji has won the Vodafone Innovation for Women prize, is an MIT Solver, and is The Pollination Project grantee. She has completed prestigious fellowships such as IFA Cross Culture, IVLP program, and the Do School fellowship. She attended the Tech Camp and won the Cultural Vistas grant. She was also a finalist of UNICEF Menstrual Hygiene Challenge in 2017 where she developed a cartoon on menstrual hygiene in Urdu which was further distributed to rural areas through a grant provided by UNESCO Pakistan for girl’s education. Currently, she is bringing The DO School's entrepreneurial hub DoX to Karachi where she will empower female social entrepreneurs in Pakistan to innovate on women’s health. Saba was a youth delegate at ICPD 2019, IGF2019, and a jury member for the World Summit Awards 2020 on digital innovation. She regularly speaks at large-scale tech conferences on women’s health innovation and was featured in a panel at Tech BBQ and World Summit of Arts and Culture in 2019. Saba’s mentors include global leaders like Clue Cofounder Ida Tin, The Do School founder Florian Hoffman , AI author & Hillert founder Christian Ehl and Adam Haim from National Institute of Mental Health.

Saba Khalid is an award-winning social entrepreneur, public speaker, activist and journalist from Karachi, Pakistan. Having worked with digital, print and television, she founded Aurat Raaj, a women empowerment, education and entertainment platform that uses digital technologies in 2017. She is behind its key product “RAAJI”, a chatbot that educates girls on taboo health, safety and hygiene topics such as menstruation, pregnancy, STDs and consent. Raaji has won the Vodafone Innovation for Women prize, is an MIT Solver, and is The Pollination Project grantee.

She has completed prestigious fellowships such as IFA Cross Culture, IVLP program, and the Do School fellowship. She attended the Tech Camp and won the Cultural Vistas grant. She was also a finalist of UNICEF Menstrual Hygiene Challenge in 2017 where she developed a cartoon on menstrual hygiene in Urdu which was further distributed to rural areas through a grant provided by UNESCO Pakistan for girl’s education. Currently, she is bringing The DO School's entrepreneurial hub DoX to Karachi where she will empower female social entrepreneurs in Pakistan to innovate on women’s health.

Saba was a youth delegate at ICPD 2019, IGF2019, and a jury member for the World Summit Awards 2020 on digital innovation. She regularly speaks at large-scale tech conferences on women’s health innovation and was featured in a panel at Tech BBQ and World Summit of Arts and Culture in 2019.

Saba’s mentors include global leaders like Clue Cofounder Ida Tin, The Do School founder Florian Hoffman , AI author & Hillert founder Christian Ehl and Adam Haim from National Institute of Mental Health.

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Jaya Rajwani is the Technology Lead at Aurat Raaj. As a dynamic software engineer from one of the top universities of Karachi, Jaya brings a background in open source technology, machine learning and natural language processing. Having been a strong advocate for women in technology, she led the IEEE Women in Engineering Student body at her university and initiated several campaigns to encourage women in STEM fields. Deeply interested in tech for social good and working on projects around data science & civic innovation in Pakistan, she joined Aurat Raaj in 2019 and helped build & improve the AI-powered chatbot Raaji for reproductive health of girls & women in Pakistan. She has been critical to the organisation in helping measure social impact and learning outcomes through data analytics. Currently, she is leading the development of a data pipeline showcased in the form of a data dashboard. As a believer in the power of Femtech, Jaya speaks regularly at various tech conferences such as Google IO , AI Summit Pakistan, WOW Festival Karachi & Tech Camp 2.0, and mentors women leaders who are using data science for social innovation. Jaya is an MIT Solver 2019, awarded the Vodafone prize for Women’s innovation and was a finalist for her innovative mapping idea for Microsoft HERE Mapathon 2019. Having been awarded a Fulbright scholarship to major in Machine Learning in the US and with mentors such as Zaki Patel, Adam Haim from National Institute of Mental Health, June Sugiyama & Asra Rizwan, she dreams of building Pakistan’s first women’s health innovation lab.

Jaya Rajwani is the Technology Lead at Aurat Raaj. As a dynamic software engineer from one of the top universities of Karachi, Jaya brings a background in open source technology, machine learning and natural language processing. Having been a strong advocate for women in technology, she led the IEEE Women in Engineering Student body at her university and initiated several campaigns to encourage women in STEM fields.

Deeply interested in tech for social good and working on projects around data science & civic innovation in Pakistan, she joined Aurat Raaj in 2019 and helped build & improve the AI-powered chatbot Raaji for reproductive health of girls & women in Pakistan. She has been critical to the organisation in helping measure social impact and learning outcomes through data analytics. Currently, she is leading the development of a data pipeline showcased in the form of a data dashboard.

As a believer in the power of Femtech, Jaya speaks regularly at various tech conferences such as Google IO , AI Summit Pakistan, WOW Festival Karachi & Tech Camp 2.0, and mentors women leaders who are using data science for social innovation.

Jaya is an MIT Solver 2019, awarded the Vodafone prize for Women’s innovation and was a finalist for her innovative mapping idea for Microsoft HERE Mapathon 2019. Having been awarded a Fulbright scholarship to major in Machine Learning in the US and with mentors such as Zaki Patel, Adam Haim from National Institute of Mental Health, June Sugiyama & Asra Rizwan, she dreams of building Pakistan’s first women’s health innovation lab.

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Musfirah Taqdees - Social Media Lead
Musfirah Taqdees - Social Media Lead

Musfirah Taqdees is the Social Media Lead at Aurat Raaj working primarily on strategy, design and content alongside website and email marketing.

Having studied marketing and entrepreneurship from one of the top universities in Pakistan, Musfirah is interested in using social media for social change. She is passionate about women empowerment and runs an online micro-blog by the name of Feministan. Feministan is focused on educating and creating awareness on how the social, political, and economic landscape of Pakistan affects women and other marginalized communities. It’s about intersectional feminism and is geared towards online activism.

Musfirah has previously worked with organizations like Aurat Foundation and helped them in policy making, it’s implementation and research on local policies and acts. She spends her time writing for different online magazines and local newspapers on feminism while also contributing to an independant feminist political organization.

Musfirah wants to utilize her abilities to further the cause of women's rights and envisions her future in working towards on-the-ground and online social and political activism. At the same time exploring opportunities and avenues to expand her learning on the multifaceted subject of feminism and how to influence communities on the subject.

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Asma Parvez - Communications Consultant
Asma Parvez - Communications Consultant

Asma Parvez is currently working as a Communications Consultant in Aurat Raaj focusing on communications, outreach and building partnerships. Having studied Public Health in UAE, Asma understands multitude determinants that affect an individuals health. With a concentration in Health Promotion, she has worked as a Health Educator providing health education to children and adults.

She has previously worked in a Health-Tech startup aiming to connect patients and doctors seamlessly. She has experience of being a Marketing and Social Media Specialist focusing on digital marketing. content production and customer service.

Asma has also worked for Digital Rights Foundation and was a part of Pakistan’s first Cyber Harassment Helpline for victims of harassment and abuse. Advocating for a safe and judgement free online space, she has helped develop comprehensive policies around privacy, advice giving and constitutional implementation for a higher quality service. She has also worked for the organization’s communication and outreach strategy and has assisted building a network of pro bono lawyers for sexual harassment cases.

Using her mix bag of skills, she is enthusiastic to combine her love for storytelling and health education to help women and girls have more control over the aspects that shape their health.

 

Our Advisors

MentorsGallery
Jehan is founder of The Nest I/O, the organization that incubated Aurat Raaj at the very start. She is our chief mission advisor and best friend.

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Jehan Ara
Jehan Ara

Jehan is founder of The Nest I/O, the organization that incubated Aurat Raaj at the very start. She is our chief mission advisor and best friend.

Christian is an author, investor and serial entrepreneur. He advises the team on artificial intelligence.

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Christian Ehl
Christian Ehl

Christian is an author, investor and serial entrepreneur. He advises the team on artificial intelligence.

June Sugiyama
June Sugiyama

June is the director of Vodafone Americas Foundation. She connects us with people in the industry, provides funding and gives feedback on our work.

Ida Tin
Ida Tin

Ida is the CEO & Co-founder of CLUE. She has been personally mentoring the founder into becoming an authentic and effective leader

 
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Patrick Diamond
Patrick Diamond

Patrick Diamond is the Senior Officer for MIT Solve’s health community. He connects us with mentors and helps us achieve our goals under the MIT Solve objective.

Valerie Mocker
Valerie Mocker

Valerie is the development director at Nesta. She provides. She advises the team on social innovation and entrepreneurship.

Katherine Kirschenmann
Katherine Kirschenmann

Katherin is a founder at The DO School and an advisor to Aurat Raaj since the early days.