Mashuda Khatun Shefali is the Executive Director of Nari Uddug Kendra (NUK), which translates to the Centre for Women's Initiative. NUK works to promote gender equality, human rights and the personal and political empowerment of women and girls in Bangladesh.
Before founding NUK, she worked in the development sector for the Bangladesh Ministry of Womens Affairs as well as for several citizen sector organizations, women's groups and donors. This period concluded with a position in the Canadian International Development Agency, where she managed development funds for a large number of local NGOs throughout the country. Shefali is currently the founder and Managing Director of the Kishorgonj Eye Hospitals and Agarashindur Community Hospital in Kishorgonj. Her latest project is the Bangladesh Women's Fund, which conducts fundraising and grant-making for local women's NGOs in order to invest in the rights and equality of women and girls. Her areas of expertise include gender, human rights programming and labor rights.
Mashuda has a Masters in General History and International Relations from the Jahangir Nagar University. She has completed a Certificate course on “Women, Men and Development” from the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex, UK. She has also completed “Gender Matters in Development” from the University of East Anglia, Norwich, in the United Kingdom, advocacy training from the Advocacy Training Institute in Washington, D.C., and diplomacy training from the University of New South Wales in Australia.
See the work of NUK in pictures.
Watch a video of Mashuda explaining how NUK is responding to women's rights issues in Bangladesh.