Salma Sobhan,, was a Bangladeshi lawyer, academic and human rights activist.
Background
Sobhan was born in London in 1937. Her father, Mohammed Ikramullah, was the first foreign secretary of Pakistan. Her mother, Begum Shaista Suhrawardy Ikramullah, was one of the first two women members of Pakistan"s Constituent Assembly, and later served as Pakistan"s delegate to the United Nations and Ambassador to Morocco.
Her mother was a member of the Suhrawardy family of Calcutta.
On her mother"s side, Sobhan was a niece of Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, premier of Bengal and Prime Minister of Pakistan, and on her father"s side she was a niece of Muhammad Hidayatullah, Vice President and Chief Justice of India.
Career
She became the first woman barrister in Pakistan in 1959. Sobhan"s sister is Princess Sarvath of Jordan. Sobhan was educated at Westonbirt School in England and studied law at Girton College, Cambridge, in 1958.
She was called to the bar from Lincoln"s Inn in 1959 and became one of Pakistan"s first women barristers.
She began working with a law firm in Karachi, M/South Surridge & Beecheno, as a legal assistant to practice in the High Court. In 1974, she was appointed research fellow at the Bangladesh Institute of Law and International Affairs.
She was responsible for editing the Supreme Court Law Reports. She served as the executive director of the organization until 2001.
Sobhan was elected to the Board of the Bangladesh Legal Aid and Service Trust, as well as that of Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) and Nijera Kori.
In 2001, she was elected to the Board of the United Nations Research Institute Foreign Social Development (United Nations Research Institute for Social Development). The Protichi Foundation started by Amartya Senator has instituted an award for journalists in her name.