No country for Afghan women: How Taliban took away Aisha's days

A day in the life of an Afghan women.

This is what I wished to write about when I started my research.

The idea occurred when planning my day, and at the same time writing a story on United Nations' reaction on the Taliban's increasing atrocities against women in Afghanistan.

I wanted to know and tell the world what a normal day now looks like, almost two years after Taliban's rule began again in 2021.

I reached out to a couple of young women in Afghanistan.

I was reading the UN's continuous commentary on what's going on in this part of the world.

About the horrific diktats and statistics that kept coming out after August 2021.

In September 2021, an order was issued banning girls from attending high school. In December 2022, women get barred from attending universities. On 24 December 2022, they were banned from working with NGOs in Afghanistan.

The assault on women's rights continues even now.

On June 24th this year, all salons across the country were given one month to close.

Now, reportedly the Taliban has banned girls over the age of 10 from attending primary school classes.

Unfortunately, it does not end here. There is an extensive list of other restrictions as well.

Gyms, Parks, cinema halls, fairs and most employment opportunities are out of reach of women.

Even for a few activities where women are allowed to step out of their house, a male figure is supposed to accompany them.

But talking to Aisha made me realise how there's so much more going on beyond numbers and diktats.

How each number had a story behind it.

Aisha tells me that before 2021, she was a person who walked under free skies.

She was a student pursuing law and teaching at a primary school at the same time.

Now, fear has gripped her life and dictates every action she takes.

Aisha had to drop out of her law degree and was banned from teaching at the school.

She has now changed her field to pursue a nursing course, the only one that Taliban has permitted for girls.

From a simple act of clicking a picture, to listening to songs, to even watching television, she cannot do anything with a relaxed mind, she says.

She says that there are certain streets she can't even go to for the fear of getting caught.

Caught for what, one might ask.

Well, for being a woman in Afghanistan, unfortunately.

Barred from undertaking any simple activity that humans like to take up.

At this point one might as well ask: so where are Afghan women and what do they do?

Aisha tells me that she sits at her home all the time on most days.

For a few hours that she goes out, her mother fears if her daughter will even return home or not.

It makes me think of how years of progress of working, raging and fighting for women's rights, is getting washed away with each day that these women spend locked up in their own homes.

I realised that, in a world where going to school, work and even a park has become a dream, Aisha does not have 24 hours.

Her days now belong to Taliban.

But slowly, feeble voices are rising.

Women staged protests against the Taliban's latest decree to ban salons.

Every now and then, when Taliban tries to tighten its grip around women's freedom, few voices do rise up to nothing but reclaim their days back.

Here is hoping that, one day, Aisha will reclaim her days.

And do things she wishes to do, in every 24 hours. 

(Disclaimer: The views of the writer do not represent the views of WION or ZMCL. Nor does WION or ZMCL endorse the views of the writer.) 

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