About Us

DR. IMRAN NISAR

Dr. Imran Nisar is the Chairman of the VPT Board. He is a Senior Instructor (Research) and NIH Fogarty fellow at the Department of Pediatrics and Child Health at Aga Khan University and obtained his medical degree from Karachi University in 2005 and a Master of Science in Epidemiology and Biostatistics from Aga Khan University in 2011. He joined the Department of Pediatrics and Child Health in September 2009 as a Research Medical officer and was promoted to Research Supervisor in July 2011. He then progressed to a faculty position as Senior Instructor in December 2012. He has been involved with grant and proposal writing and is the Principal Investigator of two grants, one being funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the other by the World Health Organization EMRO region. He is also a co-investigator on two other grants funded by GAVI and the NIH, respectively. His area of expertise is Epidemiology & Biostatistics, and his research interests include Maternal and Child Health and Vaccine Preventable Diseases. He is currently enrolled in the Ph.D. in Population and Public Health program at Aga Khan University and co-directs the Infectious Disease Epidemiology course in the Master’s program at Aga Khan University.

NAILA HASAN

Naila Hasan brings over three decades of experience in leading multinational corporations, both
domestically and internationally. Her most recent role was as the Business Manager for Pakistan
at AstraZeneca, where she served from 2013 to 2022. Previously, she held the position of
Therapy Area Director at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) for the Middle East & Africa, based in Dubai.
Before her tenure in Dubai, she worked at GlaxoSmithKline in Pakistan, holding various
positions, with her last role as Marketing Director. Ms. Hasan initiated her career at Pfizer
Pakistan. She holds an MBA degree from the Institute of Business Administration (IBA) Karachi
and is a certified director through the Pakistan Institute of Corporate Governance.
Currently, Ms. Hasan serves on the boards of Premium Textile Mills and OLP Modaraba
(formerly ORIX Modaraba).

RIAZ KHANDWALA

Riaz Khandwala has over 25 years of experience in Finance with Bank of America and Municipal Bond Insurance Association (MBIA).

Since his retirement in 2017, Riaz has kept himself busy by taking on the role of a Detective with the Metropolitan Police in London, taking flying lessons, and honing his drawing and painting skills at the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture.

Riaz holds a Master’s in Business Administration from Rice University, Houston.

DR. SANA SYED, MD, MSCR, MSDS

Dr. Sana Syed is a Pediatric Gastroenterologist whose NIH-funded work focuses on improving global health and combatting childhood undernutrition. As an adjunct research faculty at AKU and an Associate Professor in Pediatrics and Data Science at the University of Virginia in the United States, Dr. Syed aims to facilitate precision medicine by improving the diagnosis and treatment of luminal inflammatory diseases of the gastrointestinal tract which contribute to poor growth in children. Her global health work uses cutting-edge molecular and computational methods to study the intestinal structure and function of environmental enteropathy, considered the primary driver for stunting in Pakistan, Zambia, and Bangladesh, as well as other inflammatory bowel diseases. Dr. Syed is also a champion for improving diversity and enabling career development, having spearheaded diversity-focused career development programs for women and underrepresented minorities in science and medicine.

DR. FATIMA MIR

Dr. Fatima Mir is an Associate Professor in the Section of Paediatrics Infectious Diseases at the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health. She is also the Section Head of the same. She completed her FCPS Paediatrics from the College of Physicians and Surgeons Pakistan in 2006, and her MBBS from Khyber Medical College in Peshawar, Pakistan in 1997. She also has a Fellowship in Paediatric Infectious Diseases from The Aga Khan University, Pakistan which she completed in 2010.

Her research interests include Neonatal Infections and Paediatric HIV. She has had various professional roles in her field, including as an Associate Professor, Assistant Professor, and Senior Instructor at The Aga Khan University, Pakistan. She is a member of the Pakistan Medical & Dental Council and the Pakistan Society of Infectious Diseases. Her clinical designation is Consultant Paediatrician, and her specialties include Paediatric Infectious Diseases.

MIDHAT FATIMA

Midhat holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration from the Institute of Business Administration in Karachi, where she was a Merit Scholarship Holder from 2006 to 2010. Since 2011, she has been serving as the Co-Founder & Director of TEXT, a big data and mobile stakeholder engagement platform for Pakistan. The platform has been granted funds by UKaid to expand education sector services across Pakistan and the Gates Foundation to innovate in primary healthcare services in Sindh’s public sector. Midhat was a Strategy Associate at The Resource Group, a holding company managing a global portfolio of companies in the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and IT sectors, from 2010 to 2013. From 2013 to 2014, she served as an Honorary Member of The Fellowship, a series of lectures and workshops launched to groom young women and men who will lead Pakistan’s different Aga Khan Development Network institutions in the future. Her other initiatives include a web project for Oxfam USA’s project for girls’ education in Pakistan and a volunteer-based campaign for collecting donations for flood relief in Pakistan. She also attended The London School of Economics & Political Sciences in 2016 for Qualitative & Mixed Research Methods and is currently taking Data Scientist’s Toolbox from John’s Hopkins University through Online Learning.