No. 01
Faraz Siddiqui
Program Officer, Finance
Finance · New York
Vol. 01 · No. 01
A civic seal you can read
New York · MMXXVI
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SHOBAI
/ˈʃoʊbaɪ/ noun · Bangla · everyone
A civic seal for the people it names — and a homepage that reads itself, one element at a time.
- Status
- 501(c)(3)
- EIN
- 41-2765738
- Seat
- New York
§ I — Programs
Scroll to read§ I — Programs
Three programs, run precisely.
Civic, financial, legal, and AI literacy for immigrant and working-class communities in Queens — so residents and small business owners can navigate public systems, protect their money, and use new technology with confidence.
- IWorkforce development
Summer Youth Internship Program
A structured summer internship placing young people from Queens in supervised, curriculum-based training in media production, design, and client communication.
- IICivic media
Community Voices
A civic media initiative that documents how everyday New Yorkers understand the issues shaping their neighborhoods.
- IIICommunity education
Literacy Workshop Series
Free community workshops across four tracks — civic, financial, legal, and AI and digital literacy.
The Seal
Tap any number — or scroll
Element 01 of 05
The wordmark
Shobai (শবাই) is Bangla for everyone.
It names the standard we hold ourselves to: the programs we run must serve the whole of a community, not a favored slice of it.
Element 02 of 05
The eight birds
Eight birds for the eight nations of the 1985 SAARC summit in Dhaka — Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and later Afghanistan.
They mark the South Asian region we come from, without narrowing the communities we mean to serve.
Element 03 of 05
New York State
The silhouette at the center is New York State.
SHOBAI is incorporated here, operates here, and answers to the institutions here. The communities we serve are building their lives inside this map.
Element 04 of 05
The dhan
Dhan — the rice that sustains us, and that we brought with us.
The stalks frame the seal the way the harvest frames a year: as the thing that makes everything else possible.
Element 05 of 05
The concentric rings
Three rings: the family, the community, the institution.
Our work moves inward from the outermost ring — helping immigrant New Yorkers navigate the institutions of their new home, so that families and communities can hold.
§ III — Preamble
Preamble
We, the undersigned, being an association of neighbors in the State of New York, resolve to help immigrant communities — beginning with the Bengali-speaking diaspora — read the institutions of their new home, and to be read back by them in turn.
We do not write like other nonprofits. We do not run programs we cannot staff. We ship one program at a time, and we name it precisely — so that a grandmother, a case worker, and a program officer would all point at the same thing.
We hold that language is a civic act; that a form in translation is a door; that a neighbor who is seen is harder to harm. Shobai means everyone, and everyone means us.
SHOBAI Inc.April 2026New York
§ IV — The Roster
On file with SHOBAI Inc.
04 of 04
The people of SHOBAI.
A roster, kept short on purpose. We name our staff so you know exactly who is reading your letter.
No. 02Firasat Siddiqui
Program Officer, Youth Leadership
Youth Leadership · New York
No. 03Tasnim Loqman
Program Officer, Design
Design · New York
No. 04Faija Rowsyan
Marketing Officer
Marketing · New York
§ V — Contact
Contact
To whom it may concern,
If you are a program officer, a partner, or a family looking for us — write. A person replies.
We read every note. We answer in the language you write in, when we can. We don't use auto-responders.
Sincerely,
The people of SHOBAI
Signed in ink
§ Established
MMXXVI · New York