Mehvish Mushtaq

From HT Brunch, November 30 Even as you’re reading this, winds of change are blowing across India. From places as busy as Mumbai, as faraway as Erode and as troubled as Kashmir, great new ideas are sprouting, promising a better tomorrow, making us proud. Our nation of jugaad is taking a giant leap forward – inventing, adapting and creating bold new ways to make your everyday life easier. We scouted the length and breadth of the country to find the brightest innovations, and roped in author and entrepreneur Rashmi Bansal to pick the ones with the most promise. This is a list that is as diverse as it’s ingenious. They’ve already inspired us to dream big – in full-HD, actually! Now it’s your turn…

FEMINA WOMEN AWARDS 2014 MEHVISH MUSHTAQ “I don’t want to be a second someone, I want to be the first me.” So says 23-year-old Mehvish Mushtaq’s About.me page. A BE student in computer science, the driven tech geek is the creator of the Dial Kashmir Android app, a database of detailed information—addresses, phone numbers and email IDs—on essential services and relevant government departments like healthcare, education, transport and police, among others, in Kashmir. Mehvish, a Srinagar local, is the first Kashmiri to develop an Android app. It was her love of technology that drove her to take on a one-month course in application development, and her subsequent project of creating a database for the Valley. And with 10,000 plus downloads on Google Play, it appears that the app has been exceedingly popular with locals and tourists alike. Not content with developing Kashmir’s virtual yellow pages directory, Mehvish dreams about starting a software company for dynamic young Kashmir...