Dr. Aqueel Ahmed Khan holds a Master’s Degree in Social Work (1988) and a PhD in Women’s Empowerment (1999) from Jamia Millia Islamia University in New Delhi. As a social development professional, he has worked in the development sector for 30 years on social and economic issues related to women’s development and empowerment.

From the beginning working with UNHCR and Childfund India in the 80s, he has held the assumption that until and unless we build the capacity at the bottom of the pyramid, it will be difficult to achieve sustainable development. He learnt that NGO focus can be more on activity rather than results and that a systematic process of engagement was required to work with NGOs transition their orientation and capacity to achieve results.

Considering the above need, in 1995, he established Association for Stimulating Know-how (ASK), a technical support agency with a vision to transfer skill and knowledge to grassroots level institutions, government agencies and private sector. ASK focus was to change the orientation and build capacity of NGO to work on “Results” rather than on “Activities”. From facilitating capacity building workshop right from the governance body of NGOs to grassroots level functionaries, Dr. Khan worked very closely with NGOs and their communities to help understand their role in engaging together, changing community behaviors from passive recipient to active participants in process of development.

At grassroots level Dr Khan has been directly involved on issues of child labor, women’s economic empowerment, strengthening farmer capacity to operate and providing alternative livelihood for bonded labor in the mining sector.