Our History

It all began with Mysha Baqar, currently a Middle School student at Bethany Elementary in California. She believed that she could help make a difference - thus Woh Ehsaas was born. 

Having moved to Karachi, Pakistan in 2017 she was faced with a harsh and disturbing reality. The world wasn’t as simple as her life in California had made it seem. Seeing children as young as three years old begging on the streets, mothers sitting on the street next to a pile of trash while feeding their newborns, mosquitos circling everyone walking on street, children going through trash cans scavenging for something to fill their stomachs with; her ‘reality’ seemed to be crumbling with every car ride. It wasn’t until she heard Razia’s story that she decided to act.

Razia is a widow with three kids, all under the age of seven. She chose not to remarry as the likelihood of someone raising her kids as their own was slim to none. Every day she left for work, leaving her three kids at home alone, the eldest one being 7, to ensure that they had food to eat. Can you imagine a seven-year-old boy taking care of his four and two-year-old siblings? She had no choice. Rent needed to be paid, food needed to be bought, kids needed to be clothed. Razia, worked as a house cleaner for five houses, and yet she was ready to take on more work as she was strapped for cash. With Pakistan’s every increasing inflation rate, being able to provide for one’s family is becoming harder and harder. In 2017, the average inflation rate in Pakistan amounted to 4.15% compared to the previous year. Just to put things into perspective the annual inflation rate rose to 7.29% in January 2019 from 6.17% in the previous month.

Impacted deeply by Razia’s story, Mysha wanted to help other women who may be in similar situations. Being merely 13 years old, she knew that she would need help with this initiative. After sharing her thoughts with family and friends, she received a great deal of support and began gathering information to take the first steps towards creating an organization that would work towards empowering women by helping them acquire the necessary skills to become primary providers for their families. After nearly a year of due diligence, she was able to launch her initiative. The name was chosen because in the Urdu language the word ehsaas literally means “percipience,” while woh means “that.” Since the story of Razia resonated so deeply with her, the name Woh Ehsaas seemed perfect.