Rohtas gallery was founded by Suhail Abbasi, Naeem Pasha and Salima Hashmi in Rawalpindi/Islamabad in 1981. Its stated objective was to showcase art which had no support in the Zia's era. Among the artist who exhibited with Rohtas were Zubaida Agha, Zahoorul Akhlaq, Jamil Naqsh, Mussarat Mirza, Salima Hashmi, Shahid Sajjad, Sheherzade Alam and Sallahuddin Mian.

Many young artists commenced their careers in the 80's at Rohtas including Anwar Saeed, Shazia Sikandar, Quddus Mirza, Naazish Ataullah and Imran Qureshi.

Parallel to the capital. city like Lahore was in desperate need of space where youngster can come and share their thoughts and express themselves. In 2001, Salima Hashmi took the initiative by opening a gallery with the name of Art Shart, this later named and got popularity as Rohtas 2 Gallery.

Rohtas 2 made its mark by encouraging young and established artists to exhibit like Imran Qureshi, Farida Batool, Aisha Khalid, Talha Rathore, Massoma Syed, Saba Qizilbash, Risham Sayed, Saniya Samad, Hasnat Mehmood, Asad Hayee, Sira Shiekh, Seema Nusrat, Aasim Akhtar, Anwar Saeed, Zarina Hashmi, Afshar Malik, Naazish Ataullah, Quddus Mirza, Mussarat Mirza, Ruby Chishti, Huma Mulji, Faiza Butt and Naiza Khan are few names among many other artists.