Anjali Rimi (She/They) is San Francisco Bay Area based Global South API immigrant Transgender brown woman belonging to South Asian diasporic Kinnar Hindu transgender identity and experiences. With roots in India, she blossomed in Canada and belonging in the United States. She was recognized by California Legislative Assembly as a state LGBT leader in the Senate as well as the Assembly. She was awarded the Grassroots Immigration leader award by the office of community engagement and immigration affairs, City of San Francisco along with congressional recognitions from Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senator Scott Wiener, and San Francisco Mayor London Breed.

Lana Patel (she/her) is an Afro Indo Caribbean woman from New York City and a transplant to Southern California. Lana is currently the Sr Community Coordinator for Plume, a digital Healthcare company for trans people made by trans people. Prior to her role at Plume Lana worked in non profit with a focus on LGBTQ Healthcare and Transgender Services in the Southern California region. Lana studied music and psychology at Florida State University where she holds yo bachelor degrees that have served her in her professional career and career in entertainment as a singer for the trans chorus of Los Angeles. Lana is passionate about uplifting trans, black and brown communities to ensure that equitable access to resources is attainable for all.

Toni Newman(She/her) has been supporting ParivarBayArea since our journey began, with networking, fundraising, and community building. 

Toni Newman is the Director of The Coalition for Justice and Equality Across Movements at NMAC. She was previously the Interim CEO of the Black AIDS Institute and Interim President of the LYRIC Youth Foundation. Toni is currently a faculty member at the Transgender Strategy Center and the Chair of the Board of Directors for TransCanWork. She serves as the Membership Chair of the CA Black Leadership Council. Toni was the Interim Director of Employment Services at the SF LGBT Center, Executive Director for St. James Infirmary, and the Director of Development for Maitri Compassionate Care AIDS Hospital. She previously served as the Interim Director of Development & Communications at To Help Everyone Health and Wellness Centers and as a Strategic Fundraiser, Volunteer Recruiter, and Legislative Aide for Equality California.  Toni is a graduate of Wake Forest University and a current candidate for her Juris of Doctorate (JD). Additionally, Toni is a best-selling author, noted for her memoir I Rise -The Transformation of Toni Newman, released in 2011. Her memoir was based on the poem I Rise by the late Wake Forest University Reynolds Professor Dr. Maya Angelou. 

Kavi Dhan(he/hx/xe) having served on the board previously during the peak of the Pandemic returns to the board in 2023.  Kavi brings servant leadership attitude to bring processes and community engagement to the forefront.
Kavi is a South Asian, transmasculine person born and raised in San Francisco Bay Area. He is a digital media expert with a focus on public information outreach, social media management, and community engagement. In his free time, he enjoys writing, art, music, and spending time with his cat. He is excited to make connections and work together with other trans folks through ParivarBayArea bringing his lived experience and expertise to live their authentic and diverse lives.

Devesh Radhakrishnan (he/him) is a cis, gay Indian immigrant who has been affiliated with Parivar since 2019. As a member of Parivar's advisory committee, he has participated in planning and supporting multiple events for the organization and is a facilitator for Parivar's biweekly support group, Roobaroo. Devesh moved to the Bay Area after completing his PhD in Chemical Engineering at the University of Delaware and he works as a senior scientist at a biotech company in Marin, helping to manufacture therapies for rare genetic disorders. His prior community activities include volunteering with Canal Alliance, Turn Out, SF Marin Food Bank, and Shanti Project's CERV program. He also serves as a trustee for Dharni USA, a 501(c)(3) organization that focuses on enabling geography education in India. 

Esha Mehta(she/her) is a bi Indian woman. She is passionate about community building, creating equitable TGNCI access, and working in solidarity with our peer organizations. Esha has been working with Parivar Bay Area since the Fall of 2022. Her support includes tabling at local events, creating new digital content and graphics, and providing assets for our emerging programs. She is excited to continue to work in a greater capacity for the organization to bolster volunteer outreach, building inroads with peer orgs, and obtain further organizational support. She works in corporate strategy and commercial planning analytics EA and is based in San Francisco Bay Area. In her personal life, Esha enjoys weightlifting / boxing and is also an avid gamer / D&D player

​Raj Rao (he/him) is a gay ABCD project manager from Albuquerque, New Mexico. After completing his BA in international relations and Asian studies from USC, he obtained an MA in the same subjects and an MBA from the Middlebury Institute. Through living, working, and studying throughout the world, he became literate in Chinese and developed some proficiency in French, Hinglish, and Telugish. When not working a day job or supporting Parivar, he enjoys EDM, hanging out with his Beagle Desmond Rao, calligraphy, catching up with friends, and pad kee mao.

Anisha Pai (they/she) is non-binary, and grew up in Doha, Qatar. They are from Bangalore, India and currently work in Western MA, USA as a data scientist in the cybersecurity space. Anisha spends her time healing through art, movement, and writing.

Maanas Sharma (he/him) is a gay Indian-American based out of Dallas, TX. He is dedicated to the liberation of all people, particularly trans, gender non-conforming, & queer folk. Maanas is also Director of Finance at Redefy, an international non-profit dedicated to fighting all forms of injustice, and the Co-Founder & Program Director of Seeds2STEM, a youth collaborative targeted at underserved girls in Dallas/Ft. Worth. Maanas's academic interests lie in applying mathematics to create data-driven policy for radical equity. He is the Founder & Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Interdisciplinary Public Policy, previously co-authored States of emergency: The failure of prison system responses to COVID-19 at The Prison Policy Initiative, and has published other works related to STEM, equity, and policy in the MIT Science Policy Review, Youth and Policy, The Space Review, and more. In his free time, you can find Maanas playing the piano or reading the latest queer novel he can get his hands on.

Cheryl Lala-Chávez (she/her) is a first-generation Indo-Fijian American who grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. As a youngster she excelled in golf, earning a golf scholarship to UC Berkeley, where she played collegiately for the Golden Bears. Cheryl holds a Master’s degree from Columbia University and is deeply rooted in anti-colonialist and anti-racist feminist equity. After completing her professional golf career, Cheryl started working as a career coach guiding professional and Olympic athletes seeking a career after sports competition. She founded COMPETE Youth, a non-profit organization with a mission to equalize sports industry access to underserved youth through college counseling and career coaching. 

She is currently the founder of Career Rediscovered an executive career coaching business focused on workplace inclusion and career development for historically excluded individuals. Cheryl has worked in LGBTQIA+ advocacy for 5 years spanning family formation, parenting, employment and community building. She lives in San Francisco with her partner and family. 

Amir is an award-winning filmmaker and content producer with over 15 years of experience. He has produced documentaries, features, short films, music videos, branding videos, and several web series. He currently focuses on documentaries, series, and music videos.

Besides creating his own content Amir has collaborated with several award-winning directors and producers as Director of Photography and Editor. Some of his work was broadcast on PBS and MTV, and some of his films have been screened at film festivals in the U.S. and abroad.

In 2020 he co-founded the SF Queer Film Festival, which is the 2nd LGBTQI+ film festival in San Francisco, that offers an alternate platform for under-represented queer storytellers and out-of-the-box thinkers. The inaugural festival took place in San Francisco in July 2021 with a good turnout despite of the pandemic.

Amir became a filmmaker because he wanted to tell stories and capture people's unique experiences through narratives and documentaries. And because he wants to inspire through ideas and visuals that can have a lasting impact on people.

Okan Sengun is the Executive Director and Co-founder of the LGBT Asylum Project, the leading San Francisco-based nonprofit organization exclusively dedicated to providing legal representation for LGBTQ+ immigrants who are fleeing persecution and seeking asylum in the United States. The LGBT Asylum Project is the very first immigration law group to be located in the historic Castro, a beacon of hope just across the rainbow crosswalk. Okan is also the founding attorney of Okan Immigration Law Group, a private law group that handles marriage-based green card and naturalization applications as well as asylum cases based on political opinion, race, nationality and religion.Okan served as the San Francisco Asylum Office Liaison, the LGBT Coordinator and on the Advisory Council of American Immigration Lawyers Association, Northern California Chapter between 2012 and 2018.Okan Sengun serves as a panel attorney at AIDS Legal Referral Panel (ALRP) and was awarded as the “Attorney of the Year” in 2016 by the AIDS Legal Referral Panel. Okan is also a mentor immigration attorney at Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area and he is a member of Bay Area Lawyers for Individual Freedom (BALIF). Okan worked at several non-profit organizations and law firms in California and Turkey prior to starting Okan Immigration Law Group and the LGBT Asylum Project. Okan is admitted to New York Bar and U.S. Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit.