Founder and Director, The Maids’ Company and Alumni of London School of Economics and Political Science

 

Gauri is the founder of The Maids Company. She founded the company as a social enterprise seeing the immense need for formalization in the urban domestic work sector. The Maids Company works towards professionalizing the urban domestic work sector while upholding worker rights. The company has a unique workers co-ownership model that balances employer needs and worker rights.

 

Gauri also set up the Urban Mahila & Mazdoor Alliance (UMA) in Ludhiana, Punjab in 2007 with an aim to make urban poor migrant women economically independent, healthy, and secure. Based on her extensive research within the poor migrant communities in urban Punjab, she has developed a unique service delivery model through which her organization provides debt reduction, enterprise incubation and health security services to its clients.

 

Prior to these two ventures, Gauri worked at the grassroots level for 5 years with Self Employed Women's Association (SEWA), India, to closely understand the issues and needs of under-privileged women.

 

Gauri holds a Masters in Social Policy and Development from the London School of Economics & Political Science and a degree in architecture.