The mission came first.
The tech followed.
- Three graduate degrees — Brandeis (Heller School), Canadian Mennonite University, University of Balochistan
- PM Youth Excellence Award (2022) · ADB Climate Resilience Award (2024) · British Council Global Changemaker
- Featured in Internet Society's global documentary on digital inequality
- Only Pakistani organisation selected for AI Opportunity Fund: Asia-Pacific · WIRE: MIT Solve 2025 Semi-Finalist
- Atlas Corps (U.S. State Dept.) · Rise Up (Gates Foundation) · DO School · ISOC Community Network Leadership
- Media: BBC · VOA · The Independent · Express News · Sama TV · ARY · News 24
- Funded by AVPN, Google.org, Internet Society & Asian Development Bank
I came to AI through development work — not the other way around. After years studying how communities are shaped by systems of power and exclusion, I watched artificial intelligence become the most consequential of those systems. The question underneath all of my work has always been the same: who gets left out?
Urdu AI started from that gap — and grew into Pakistan’s leading AI literacy platform, now reaching over one million people through social media, a weekly newsletter, a mobile app, and workshops across the country. The largest Urdu-language AI education community in the world, built without a venture round and without corporate backing.
220 million people speak Urdu. Almost none of the world’s AI education reaches them. So I built the infrastructure to change that.
Then came PakSpeed — because you cannot talk about digital inclusion without honest data on who actually has connectivity and who doesn’t. In its first seven days, Pakistan’s first community-owned internet speed monitoring network logged over 15,000 tests. Real data. Real accountability. Built for the people it measures.
WANG and its innovation lab WALI have been working on the ground for over a decade — girls’ education through the Pakistan Scottish Scholarship Scheme, flood rehabilitation, rural digital literacy, and youth leadership in communities where the digital divide is not a statistic but a daily reality. After the 2022 floods, WANG built fifty sustainable homes for women-led families in Balochistan. Programmes like Kaka’s Garden and Play. Learn. Lead. create safe spaces for women and children — combining sport, innovation, and community leadership. Now, through WIRE — the WANG Initiative for Rural Empowerment — the work extends into women-led social enterprise: over 500 women empowered, 200+ girls trained, a 60% average income increase, and a 100% solar-powered hub turning traditional crafts into sustainable livelihoods through digital skills and e-commerce. A 2025 MIT Solve semi-finalist. Trusted and funded by Internet Society, AVPN, Google.org, and the Asian Development Bank.
AI for Edu brings independent, vendor-neutral AI guidance to educators and institutions worldwide. AI Viewer breaks down the global AI landscape for a professional English-language audience. PakSpeed holds ISPs accountable with real connectivity data. Five platforms, two continents, thirty-five million people reached every month — more than forty-five million cumulative content views and counting.
Different platforms. Different communities. One conviction: AI should belong to everyone who needs it.