Leading the team
Uks is fueled by an incredible team working in a difficult environment. We have dedicated and passionate leaders guiding the organization.
OUR FOUNDER
Tasneem Ahmer
Executive Director and Founder of Uks Research and Resource Centre.
Twenty five years ago Tasneem single handedly founded Uks to take up the challenging task of monitoring Pakistan’s media for its portrayal of women. A journalist by profession, Tasneem’s passions and expertise include advocacy on gender equity, women and human rights, political rights, HIV/AIDS, health, violence against women, education, gender sensitization, radio productions and media monitoring. She has worked in the media in different capacities and produced a number of radio programs, digital series, documentaries, research studies, reports and publications, and conducted workshops and trainings for media, radio producers, hosts, presenters, journalists. She has a strong network in the media industry and is the editor/ writer of more than 50 publications Under her leadership, Uks has seen many firsts – its own in-house state-of-the-art radio studio, inclusion of Pakistan in the GMMP in the last two rounds, first-ever gender-sensitive code-of-ethics for the media in the South Asian region to name a few.
In 1998, she received the Mary Morgan Hewett Award on Excellence in Feature Writing and in 2009, she received the prestigious International Media Leadership Award from Internews -USA. In 2018 she received a Lifetime Achievement Award by Women Chamber of Commerce and Industry for her contribution to women’s rights and the campaign to sensitise media on women issues.
She has a Master’s degree in Communication from the University of Hawaii, USA.
Shaista Yasmeen
Shaista Yasmeen has a Masters in Political Science from the University of Peshawar. She is a Project Manager at Uks. Shaista has 18 years of experience in community mobilization, coordination, implementation, and management of community-based programmes, having significant research experience of news monitoring, evaluation & data enumeration.
Ali Nisar
Ali Nisar is a Research Assistant at Uks. He helps conduct researches, writes research proposals, and conceptualized and executes projects. He also oversees the development of modules and curricula for the trainings, orientations and capacity building exercises. He has a BS in Media & Communication from the International Islamic University Islamabad.
Zafran Awan
Zafran Awan is a research assistant, media monitor and content producer at Uks. He assists and facilitates in conducting researches, and also providing visual-based evidence to support the research and advocacy. Zafran has an M.Sc in Mass Communication
Injie Anis
Injie Anis is a Media and Research coordinator at Uks, She monitor reports from Pakistani media – in English, Urdu, and Sindhi languages – and creates quantitative reports for UNICEF. She also creates infographics and social media posts for Uks. She has a BS in Mass Communication from National University of Science & Technology
Neha Jerry
Neha Jerry does media monitoring, online data punching, transcriptions and translations at Uks. She has a BSc. In International Relations from Quaid-e-Azam University.
Shahrezad Samiuddin
Shahrezad Samiuddin is a senior communication consultant working with Uks. She manages internal communication and drafting of content for reports and social media. She also creates effective communication strategies. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Marketing
Syed Sarmad Hussain
Syed Sarmad Hussain is Uks’ Finance and Administration Manager. He manages all financial matters of the organization and plans and coordinates all administrative procedures and systems.
