 Obaid-Chinoy is a TED Fellow and the recipient of the "Hilal-e-Imtiaz", the second highest civilian award in Pakistan "Time magazine" named Sharmeen in its annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world for 2012.On 23 March 2012, Pakistan's president conferred the second highest civilian award, the Hilal-e-Imtiaz, on Obaid-Chinoy for bringing honor to Pakistan as a filmmaker.Sharmeen was ranked 37th on Desiclub.com's list of the 50 Coolest Desis of 2009.