Prince Karim Aga Khan IV, the spiritual leader of some 15 million Ismaili Muslims worldwide, died in Portugal on February 4 aged 88.

The Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN) announced the passing of the “49th hereditary Imam of the Shia Ismaili Muslims and direct descendant of the Prophet Muhammad” on their website.

The Aga Khan was born into a wealthy family. He lived what most people would call a lavish life, mingling with heads of state and royalty, and devoted much time to his passion of horse-breeding and horse racing.

His horses won the Derby Stakes five times. One of the horses, Shergar, won in 1981 by the widest margin in Derby history, only to be kidnapped two years later. The horse was never found, and no suspects were ever apprehended.

But the Aga Khan was also a philanthropist, and impact investor, who was always devoted to his people, the Ismailis, many of whom live in remote areas of some of the world’s poorest countries.

Aga Khan IV's grandfather, Sultan Mahomed Shah Aga Khan III, who died in 1957, chose his successor as a person of the world for the post-World War II times (Credit: AKDN).

For these people in particular, the Aga Khan was not only their spiritual leader, but also the source of better education, the builder of needed infrastructure, and in some cases, their saviour in desperate times.

Matt Reed, the global director of Institutional Partnerships for the Aga Khan Foundation, told bne IntelliNews that the Aga Khan was “a spiritual leader who felt an obligation to humanity to improve the quality of life for all people living in countries where he or his community were present.”

Prince Karim Al-Hussaini was born in Geneva, Switzerland on December 13, 1936. His father was Prince Aly Salomone Khan, while his mother was Joan Yarde-Buller, a British socialite. After the two divorced in 1949, Prince Aly Khan married movie star Rita Hayworth.

As a small child, Prince Karim lived in Kenya, but he moved to Switzerland to attend school. Afterwards, he majored in Islamic history at Harvard University. His grandfather, Sultan Mahomed Shah Aga Khan III, died in 1957 having directed that Prince Karim, rather than Karim’s father or uncle, should be the next Aga Khan.

Aga Khan III gave this instruction because he felt it was important that the new Aga Khan was a person of the world in atomic physics and other post-World War II technologies and inventions.

Prince Karim was 20 years-old when he became the Aga Khan. Despite his position, he returned to Harvard with an entourage and completed his studies, graduating in 1959.

Aga Khan IV established the Aga Khan Foundation in 1967 “to address the root causes of poverty and support community institutions to carry out sustainable, locally-driven initiatives that improve the quality of life.”

When Ismaili communities in several African countries were expelled or displaced, along with other South Asians, in the early 1970s, the Aga Khan helped to resettle them in Asia, Europe and North America.

Children in Osh, the Kyrgyz Republic, at an Aga Khan Foundation teacher training class on latest early childhood development pedagogies and techniques (Credit: AKDN).

The Aga Khan’s work expanded over the years. Hundreds of schools, two universities and dozens of hospitals and clinics were built.

He also sponsored thousands of agricultural projects, including research into hybrid crops that can grow at high altitudes, as well as the building of large-scale energy infrastructure. Moreover, he helped with the construction of small hydropower plants that serve remote communities, invested in telecommunications, organised microfinancing, and more.

In 2008, all of these projects were grouped under a common umbrella, and the Aga Khan Development Network was created.

The AKDN now works in more than 30 countries, but one of the most important areas the organisation works in is the Pamir Mountains, where Ismaili communities of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Tajikistan are found.

There are some 500,000 Ismailis living in Pakistan. The Aga Khans have kept close connections with the country and have been doing philanthropic work in its Ismaili region for more than a century. The father of Aga Khan IV served as Pakistan’s ambassador to the United Nations in the late 1950s.

The AKDN started work in Afghanistan and Tajikistan in the 1990s, a time when there was civil war in both countries.

The Aga Khan is credited by many with saving many of the more than 200,000 Ismailis in mountainous, remote Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast (GBAO) of eastern Tajikistan from starvation during the Central Asian country’s 1992-1997 civil war.

In the years after the war, the cash-strapped Tajik government was unable to spend money on GBAO, a region that the government’s civil war opponents used for bases because of its nearly inaccessible terrain.

The AKDN stepped in to assist and helped the government develop educational facilities, businesses and infrastructure in GBAO. It also built several bridges to connect the region to Badakhshan Province in neighbouring Afghanistan, where Ismaili communities are present.

The organisation helped establish the University of Central Asia in the GBAO regional capital Khorog (and later another UCA in Naryn, Kyrgyzstan), providing opportunities for local young people to obtain higher education without leaving GBAO.

Over the course of some 30 years, the Aga Khan spent some $1bn on projects in GBAO.

Condolences over the death of Aga Khan IV were expressed by many world leaders, past and present. King Charles III said he was "deeply saddened" on the passing away of his "personal friend of many years" (Credit: AKDN).

Since it started work in Afghanistan during the mid-1990s, the AKDN has never left the country. Some 200,000 Ismailis live in Afghanistan.

The AKDN is currently working in 26 Afghan provinces, 11 directly and 15 in partnership with other organisations, benefitting some 12mn people. The AKDN has actually expanded its Afghanistan operations in the years since the Taliban returned to power in August 2021.

The network has proved more than a lifeline to the communities it has assisted. It has helped all of them to improve their living situations and prospects, not only in the Pamir Mountains, but in other parts of Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

Reed, of the Aga Khan Foundation, said Aga Khan IV had three principles for the AKDN’s work, namely “Absolute commitment” to working with all the people in the communities where it operates, regardless of faith or background; establishing institutions that would endure long after his death, whether the governments of these countries were weak or strong; and community ownership of all the projects so that everything the AKDN built or helped establish, either belonged to, or was managed by, the communities or local people.

Aga Khan IV has been described in the media as a “socialite” or “playboy,” and that was part of his life. But the work he did for not only his Ismaili communities, but also for the people living with or near these communities, was so often invaluable.

The schools and universities, hospitals, power plants, rural projects, hotels, parks and local financing institutions Aga Khan IV leaves behind will benefit the people of these regions for generations to come.

It is therefore not surprising that among those expressing their condolences on the Aga Khan’s death and praise for his work were Pakistani President Asif Ai Zardari, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, former Afghan president Hamid Karzai, Tajik President Emomali Rahmon, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, French President Emmanuel Macron, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and King Charles III.

(Credit: AKDN).

It is a proud legacy, and it now falls to his son, Prince Rahim (pictured above), to carry on the work as Aga Khan V.