(Abul Kasem’s note: A reader from Afghanistan sent me this account of Talibans)
Overview
As a school kid, I vividly remembered the nights and days of Talibans in Afghanistan. The words most befitting to describe them are: barbaric, cruel, and inhuman. Today, I am a grown up adult. But even now, remembering those frightening days of real Islam fills my mind with terror, agony, frustration, and trepidation. I endured those Islamic terror filled days, and somehow, completed my high school under the Islamic movement of Taliban. I have a lot to say, a lot to remember, and a lot to be sad for, believe me. What the world has known about the brutalities and barbarism of the Taliban regime (read real Islam) is nothing in comparison to what we, the common people of Afghanistan have endured with extreme pain. What you will read here is the actual, first hand account of those dreadful nights and days of Talibans.
To be honest, Talibans were the embodiment of real Islam. They were inured to mete out in full all the inhuman and barbaric Islamic principles on which the entire edifice of Islam is founded. Following the true Islamic laws, they used to behead and execute men and women in public. Public whipping was a very ordinary practice—almost a daily affair, to say it mildly. If a “Mahram”, a legal male had not accompanied a woman, she would definitely face beatings and whippings in full view of others. I guess this was certainly the manner in which Islamic retribution was meted out to women during the golden days of Muhammad’s Islam.
For a thief, the Islamic punishment was that his /her hand would be cut off in public. Punishment for adultery committed by single male and female was whipping one hundred times, which eventually caused them to die. For the married male and female, the punishment was stoning to death, an unacceptable, inhuman, undemocratic and barbaric punishment system. Talibans banned watching Television, going to school, and learning modern sciences. Even learning of history, geography, and mathematics were totally banned. In the religious schools (Madrasa) the only activities were the recitation and the memorisation of the Qu’ran. Women had to cover themselves in Burga (a kind of clothing which covers all parts of a woman’s body). All men had to wear turbans, in the fashion of Islamic days of the seventh century. One could never dare to talk about humanity, democracy, respect for other faiths and religions. This is largely true in today’s Afghanistan even when the Talibans are no longer in power. I guess this suppression of basic human rights is endemic in all Islamic communities. They call non Muslims infidels, or pagans. The Talibans strongly believed that the non Muslims must face murder—the infidels should be killed! During Taliban days prayers were obligatory. Talibans used to shave the heads of young males. They believed that having hair on head would cause sexual temptation and more seduction in the community.
As a 23-year-old man, living in Afghanistan, I have witnessed with my own eyes and experienced with my own person all these mind boggling events. I always remember those Taliban days. Memories of those days always make me sad, emotional, and dejected. I vividly remember how I had been beaten, humiliated, and nearly killed when I spoke in favour of tolerance, democracy, and religious freedom. More to my experience with the Talibans, I witnessed innocent people killed, women beaten up in public. During those frightful Islamic days, I soul searched about Islam—is what Taliban doing real Islam? I had questions in my mind, very penetrating questions—I wanted to analyse and find the compatibility between Islam and Taliban. Is what Islam said, was exercised by Taliban? Can we call Taliban truly Islamic? Are men really superior to women in Islam? Does Islam justify public beating of women by the Talibans? Are executions, beheadings, and stoning to death Islamic? Do these barbaric punishments conform to the standard of modern civilised world?
To find answers to the above questions I searched and searched. What I discovered was really very disturbing. I found that the long history of Islam is truly the history of intolerance, barbarism, cruelty, war, and total apartheid treatment of women. I do not believe it was only Talibans in Afghanistan, who practiced those uncivilised conducts. We can find the same story in Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and in most of Islamic countries.
