Sonali Kolhatkar, Founder, Host and Executive Producer of Rising Up with Sonali

Sonali Kolhatkar is the host and creator of YES Presents: Rising Up With Sonali, a program built on the foundation of her earlier show, Rising Up With Sonali, and Uprising, which became the longest running drive-time radio show on KPFK in Los Angeles hosted by a woman.

Sonali has won numerous awards for her journalism including Best TV Anchor from the LA Press Club in 2015, and was also nominated for Best Radio Anchor 4 years in a row. She won First Place at the Los Angeles Press Club Annual Awards for Best National Commentary Political Online (2022) and Best Election Commentary (2016).

She is the author of the new book, Rising Up: The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice (Citylights, 2023) and is the Racial Justice editor at Yes! Magazine. She is also a Writing Fellow and the Senior Correspondent for the Independent Media Institute‘s Economy for All project. Previously Sonali was a weekly columnist for Truthdig.com.

Her earlier book was Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence, co-authored with Jim Ingalls. She is also co-Director of the non-profit group, Afghan Women’s Mission. She has a Masters in Astronomy from the University of Hawaii, and two undergraduate degrees in Physics and Astronomy from the University of Texas at Austin. Watch her 2014 Tedx talk, My journey from astrophysicist to radio host.

Originally from India and born and raised in the United Arab Emirates, she is also an artist, musician, baker and cook and lives with her husband and two children in Pasadena, California.