5 Inspiring Muslimah Who Are Breaking Sterotypes

It’s no secret that Muslim women everywhere are often portrayed in a negative or weak light. Here, we’d like to share inspiring modern Muslim women who are shattering the negative stereotypes of Muslim women. These women prove that they contribute positively to society, despite the setbacks they face.

5. Diana Sabrain

Diana Sabrain who is the founder of a game-changing platform OneAgrix  did not set out to be an entrepreneur. OneAgrix is a B2B global halal marketplace that uses blockchain technology to combat food fraud. She went into entrepreneurship out of altruistic motive. She needed to generate income for her family at a young age during an economic crisis. She wanted to give her family a good life and this drive and noble intention is made her the person she is today.  In addition, OneAgrix also enables micro and small business owners to access OneAgrix global marketplace, by working with small cooperatives, in faraway places such as in Africa.

The lesson from her story is that success always follows a person who puts the well being of others above their interest. 

4. Farveen Fatimah Ibrahim

Farveen is the founder and CEO of Tempah app, an app for Muslim-friendly and halal marketplace app in Malaysia. What’s different about this app, from the more well-known marketplace food apps is that it solely focuses on halal-only food, as well as opening up home-cooked food by home chefs to the marketplace in addition to halal restaurants.  The app is currently self-funded without any external funding. 

This is purposely done in order to empower Muslim women, especially single moms and stay-at-home moms, to increase their participation in businesses, and empower them economically.

3. Dr. Dayang Anita Abdul Aziz

Dr. Dayang Anita Abdul Aziz made history when she performed minimally-invasive surgery on a 14-day old baby at the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Centre (UKMMC).  The surgery made history as it was the first kind in the world, at that time.  The surgery was done to protect the baby against brain damage, as the baby’s pancreas produced excess insulin.  She is the head of pediatric surgery in UKMMC. 

2. Dr. Burçin Mutlu-Pakdil

Dr. Burçin is an inspiring person, regardless of gender or faith. She discovered a whole new and rare galaxy, and the galaxy is now named after her. She discovered the new galaxy, named the Burcin Galaxy, while studying for her PhD in astrophysics.  She discovered the galaxy at a relatively young age, at younger than 30 years old. 

What’s more inspiring about her is that her parents did not even finish high school, and her grandparents were illiterate. She had to overcome her science professors’ biases of wanting to study physics at university. 

1.Dr. Aishah Tul Radziah Lebai Hussin

Dr Aishah, Dr. Fisol with chefs from the Hotel Granvia, Osaka, Japan

We recently wrote about her here. Dr. Aishah is a healthy snack food entrepreneur, who is also a practicing medical doctor.  She started her health food snacks business after she became obese after an unhealthy lifestyle and food choices. According to her, losing weight was easy, as it was only about chosing healthy food and a healthy lifestyle. 

From there, she formulated her healthy snack food made of Asian superfoods and granola, under the brand name Dr. Aishah, and is now exporting her products to Japanese luxury hotels. She only became an entrepreneur after she turned 60 years of age. This year alone, Dr. Aishah won two awards, in the best CEO category and best innovative food category. 

Farah I, Writer & Researcher

Farah Ishak is a Content Writer at Halalop. She grew up in the United Kingdom where she obtained her Bachelor’s degree in Management. Later, she completed her MBA and held senior-level positions in Malaysian based MNC. She left the corporate world to be with her young kids. She is passionate about issues concerning Muslim women, Startups and Muslim businesses in general.