Her father, now deceased, was Idries Shah, a writer of Sufi fables. Part of his family was originally from Paghman, Afghanistan. He was also Scottish.
Her mother was Indian and British.
Her first trip to Afghanistan was when she was 21 years old. She worked for 3 years in Peshawar as a reporter covering the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
She has also worked as a journalist for Channel 4 News, which she left in 2001.
She married and divorced (after 5 years) a Swiss reporter, whom she met in Peshawar.
She worked with James Miller (filmmaker) on several projects including the films Beneath the Veil, Unholy War, and Death in Gaza.
She has a boyfriend and currently lives in a flat in East London.
SairaShah, in Beneath the Veil (Channel 4), is the latest reporter with hidden cameras to enter Afghanistan to expose the repressiveness of its Islamic government.
Shah, being half-Afghan and often dressing in robes that left only a letterbox slit for her eyes, had an advantage in being able to visit areas that would be impossible for a Westerner such as Langan.
Shah talked to women who had become beggars because the Taleban government forbids them to work: their children starve or, if they are lucky, subsist on mouldy breadcrumbs.
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