CHAYN is an open-source project that leverages technology to empower women against violence and oppression so they can live happier and healthier lives. Running solely on the passion of skilled volunteers, Chayn leverages technology to address the problems women face today. We are also a pro bono service to charities who work with vulnerable women.
EMPOWERING WOMEN
against oppression through access to information, support & tools
MOTIVATING COMMUNITIES
into action by brainstorming and creating solutions that empower women & supporting organisations.
CREATING
tools, projects & events that can enable women and organisations that support them.
Ethos
Everything that Chayn does has originated from a burning passion for gender equality, and for the emancipation and empowerment of women against overwhelming tides of patriarchy, oppression and abuse. Everything that Chayn does is to protest the patriarchal and misogynistic culture that still permeates the society. We don’t want to just speak out, but also act to stop it. We stand proudly with the open-source movement to create, distribute and benefit from a culture and society of free knowledge. All our materials are licensed under CC 4.0(SA).
Story of Origin
Chayn started in May 2013, when Hera Hussain wanted to create a platform to inform women experiencing domestic violence in Pakistan. She then spent 3 months crowdsourcing all the material for ChaynPakistan.org from 70 global volunteers. As the website was launched, a strong team of volunteers emerged who believed in creating other solutions to empower women. We’ve come a long ways since as can be seen by our Projects & Tools.
“Tech and society are always further ahead than governments, and governments are playing catch up, but we’re slowly starting to see this change. By using tech to fill gaps in access to information and justice, we can either complement efforts that governments and NGOs are already doing, or point out where they are failing. We always come back to independence and happiness as our two biggest goals. And that’s because that tackles issues that start from not being able to choose what women want to do with their lives and takes them to a point where they’re not only choosing what they want to do with life—but being treated equally once they’ve made that choice.” – Hera Hussain, GOOD Magazine
SUPPORTED BY
We have the honour of being supported as project by CIVA, who supported successful social enterprises such as MyBnk, UnLtd, Buzzbnk and FoodCycle in the early days. We would also like to thank Filanthropy for supporting us for their November 2013 programme. As we are a 100% volunteer-run initiative, our volunteers are part of many incubation and social innovation fellowships for Chayn-supported projects such as Comic Relief, o2 Think Big, girls20, ELP, Solve(previously known as Hub Launchpad), and Kering Foundation.
AWARDS
Forbes 2018 30 Under 30 – Social Entrepreneurship
Nesta/New Observer’s New Radicals 2016
Kyoorious Awards: Best Direct Digital Response & Use of Social Media
CSR Congress 2013
