LAHORE -- Only 13% of women in Pakistan own bank accounts, the fourth-lowest proportion in the world.
When she was growing up, Mashal Wali watched her mother, Nasreen Muzaffar, put away a little money every week, storing it in a safe in their home. She would bring it with her when she went to the jamatkhana, a prayer hall for people from the Ismaili subsect of Shiite Islam. There, Muzaffar would contribute the money to a group savings account organized by managers at the adjacent community center near her home in the Gilgit-Baltistan region of northern Pakistan.
