Harris Bokhari, is a young man who is clearly going places. An accountant by profession, Bokhari has found his calling by nurturing young talent, particularly those from BME communities. He’s the CEO of Patchwork UK, which undertakes master classes in civic engagement, and it also runs an ‘MP of the Year’ award. Bokhari is a modest man, and rarely seen in pictures. So the picture we’ve used is of his beloved late father.
With his sister Hina Bokhari, Harris founded the Naz Legacy Foundation, in honour of their father Nawazish Bokhari, a campaigner who was the first British Muslim to run a secondary school in the country.
Now, for his services to young people and interfaith work, Harris Bokhari has been awarded an OBE. With his easy charm and steely determination Bokhari can call upon the top political figures to talk to the young men and women on his schemes. He’s even become an ambassador for the HRH Prince Charles.
Well done Harris, your father, who also received an OBE, would be deeply proud of his son.
But, I think it was Mandela who said something like; ‘a man with vision does not stop at the top of the hill to linger at the vista for too long, because the long walk is not ended’.
Harris is board member for the Prince's Trust Mosaic initiative. He was appointed as Mosaic’s first honorary patron and was awarded the prestigious Beacon Award for Philanthropy Advocate 2013 for raising £1m within 12 months for various charities working in deprived communities in the UK, becoming the youngest and first Muslim to receive this honour. He now serves as a judge for the awards.
Harris is the co-founder of the Naz Legacy Foundation, which aims to enhance educational excellence and positive integration. It was established in memory of his late father, Naz Bokhari OBE, the first Asian/Muslim head teacher in the UK. The Foundation was honoured to be awarded the Big Society Award 2014 by the Prime Minister. Harris is also an ambassador for the British Asian Trust.
Harris’s interfaith work has included organising the first ever engagement event between national community, women and youth leaders from the Jewish and Muslim communities meeting with the new Chief Rabbi in Finchley Kinloss Synagogue. Harris was one of the first Muslims to be invited to the Chief Rabbi’s installation ceremony and was selected to be an Ariane De Rothschild fellow, in partnership with Cambridge University’s Judge Business School and King’s College. Harris also organised the first youth interfaith iftar at Lambeth Palace, which brought together the Archbishop of Canterbury, Chief Rabbi, Mayor of London and over 100 youth leaders from each of London’s boroughs – representing all faiths and none.
Harris was awarded an OBE in Her Majesty’s Birthday Honours List for services for young people and interfaith relations; named as one of 40 people in finance who goes further for good causes by Financial News Extra Mile List; and named as one of London’s most influential figures by the Evening Standard’s Progress 1000 list.
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Harris Bokhari 