Seema Azis is one of the most prominent business leaders in South Asia. However, she is mostly known for her work in improving the education sector of Pakistan. Aziz runs more than 700 English medium schools in Pakistan for the underprivileged.

A woman steers a vehicle of the ‘Pink-Rickshaw’. Zar Aslam, president of Pakistan’s non-profit Environment Protection Fund, launched the scheme for women on roads who are often harassed by male auto-rickshaw drivers while they get to their homes or work places. © picture-alliance/dpa/R. Dar

Parveen Bibi was one of the first women to drive a rickshaw in Lahore. Many men react with hostility, but she says it’s her business how she supports her family.

The lights in the hall grew dim as  German writer Sarah Khan began reading an excerpt from her latest book Die Gespenster von Berlin or The Ghosts of Berlin at the Annemarie Schimmel Cultural Institute in Lahore, Pakistan’s  second-largest city.