Born: 1987 (Bangalore, India)
Biography:
Kirthi Jayakumar (born 15 December 1987) is a peace educator, a women, peace, and security and feminist foreign policy practitioner, lawyer, and writer. She is a Commonwealth Scholar, a Vital Voices (VV) Lead Fellow, a VV Engage Fellow, a Local Pathways Fellow, and a World Pulse Impact Leader. Kirthi is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. She served as an advisor to the G7 through the Women7 under the German Presidency of the G7 in 2022, and currently under the Japanese Presidency of the G7 in 2023. She was named as one of UN Women Asia Pacific’s 30 for 2030. Kirthi also founded The Gender Security Project, an initiative working at the cross-section of gender, peace, security, feminist foreign policy, and transitional justice through research, reportage, and documentation. Previously, she founded The Red Elephant Foundation, an initiative built on storytelling, civilian peace-building, and activism for gender equality.
Kirthi was born as Kirthi Jayakumar in Bangalore, India, to Hindu parents. She studied law at the School of Excellence in Law, Chennai, Tamil Nadu. She earned her MA in Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution from the UN-mandated University for Peace in Costa Rica and an MA in Peace and Conflict Studies from the Centre for Trust, Peace, and Security at Coventry University, on a Commonwealth Scholarship. She has worked as a UN online volunteer.
Kirthi is an activist on women’s rights issues and peace and conflict. She formerly ran The Red Elephant Foundation and currently runs The Gender Security Project. She has worked in voluntary capacities with 16 civil societies and UN agencies through the UN Online Volunteering program. She is a columnist for the Deccan Chronicle/Asian Age. Kirthi is a Global Youth Ambassador with A World at School run by Sarah Brown.
Kirthi coded and created Saahas, a mobile app that supports survivors of gender-based violence worldwide to find support and facilitates active bystander intervention. Saahas was listed on the Global Innovation Exchange and received recognition from DEF India under the SM4E Awards. For her work with Saahas, Kirthi was listed on the shortlist for the WATC 100 Women in Tech List. Saahas supports access to information and helplines through a mobile app, Facebook Chatbot, and Telegram Chatbot. She produced two e-Books on entrepreneurship in Africa with the AAE and headed a team that worked for the opening of the first-ever school in Okoijorogu, Nigeria, a village that had never had a school for its children until 2013.
Kirthi is also an artist, working on pen and ink to curate Zen doodles. She uses doodling as a means to express her activism for gender equality.
Awards:
– Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.