Female professors who have been dismissed from universities under orders from Hibatullah Akhundzada, the Taliban Supreme Leader, are voicing serious concern over the hardships, despair, and hopelessness they now face in their lives. They say that economic pressures, unemployment, and confinement to their homes have left many professors struggling with psychological, mental, and physical health problems. These professors say that accounts from their other colleagues also describe home confinement, the gradual collapse of hopes, and the loss of their social and economic standing. According to them, after being removed from their jobs, even their family relationships have changed, and the psychological pressures on them have intensified. They emphasize that years of exclusion from work and education have placed their lives in a painful deadlock, and they feel they have been completely forgotten.
Female professors say that home confinement and unemployment have subjected them to endless suffering, and that even their families’ treatment of them has changed compared to the past. They say that not only have they lost their social standing, but they also no longer hold the respect and status they once had within their own families. They stress that they are confronting severe psychological, mental, and economic pressures, and they feel that all female professors have been forgotten. According to them, educational institutions, having completely barred women from education and study, are no longer a suitable environment for teaching, even for male students.
Farzana (pseudonym), a professor at a university in the northeast of the country, says that continuing to live under these conditions has become difficult and even unbearable for her. According to her, the persistence of the current situation is worrying and painful.
This university professor says: “Life has become so difficult that every door I knock on in search of a work opportunity is closed to me. Despite years of experience, education, and effort, I still have not been able to find a suitable opportunity for work or employment, and this situation is truly worrying and discouraging. I am going through a difficult and prolonged period.”
Ms. Farzana adds: “Sometimes I think to myself that since the path to finding work is closed to me, I should pursue another skill, such as sewing or cooking, but I am so exhausted and depressed by my living conditions that I do not even have the opportunity for that. Naturally, life under such conditions has its own bitterness and disorder, and every day that passes is spent amid thousands of hardships, difficulties, and a lack of direction. Sometimes I suffer from having no money, and sometimes from the loss of the social standing and identity I once had outside the home, and I think about who I was before and who I have become now, exactly like other ordinary people and women who spend their time at home.” According to her, she had hoped that alongside earning a living through her salary as a university professor, she would also enjoy a good social standing, but Taliban rule caused her to lose everything.
Female professors who have been dismissed by the Taliban emphasize that the situation of all of them is worrying, and that continued confinement to their homes has plunged their futures into crisis. They say that during this period they have faced agonizing hardships and difficulties.
Noora, one of the female professors, says: “At first, the Taliban told female professors to stay home until further notice. Then they set a salary of five thousand afghanis for us, and later dismissed and laid off everyone. Wherever we go to seek work, no door is open to us. The professors I remain in contact with also complain about this period of confinement and say that this situation is very bitter and difficult for them, and that they are facing tremendous hardship. Home confinement is truly difficult for a university professor. Today we have neither a decent economic situation nor have we retained our social standing.”
Speaking with worry and sorrow about the continuation of her current situation, this professor says: “We not only lost our jobs, but we also faced enormous psychological pressure. Even the best families, who considered themselves supportive of women, changed during this period and created problems for the women confined to their homes within their families, subjecting them to intense psychological pressure.”
Noora adds: “After I was confined to my home, for an entire year I could not walk and did not know how to go on with my life. All my aspirations were destroyed, and I lost all my hopes. I do not know how long this situation will continue. The United Nations (UN) has also taken no action in this regard. The international community has not defended women and the female teaching staff, and no effective action has been taken on behalf of university professors.”
After seizing control of Afghanistan, the Taliban gradually restricted the presence of women and girls in educational institutions and ultimately ordered a complete ban. At present, no woman is permitted to continue her higher education at any public or private educational institution.
Abdul Baqi Haqqani, the Taliban’s former minister for the Ministry of Higher Education (MoHE), stated at a meeting with staff and professors of public and private universities on August 29, 2021, that girls could not study in the same classroom together with boys.
The group subsequently ordered that a curtain be installed between male and female students in university classrooms. However, it was not long before they separated the classes, saying that male and female students would attend university on different days of the week. Under this decision, female students attended classes at universities three days a week, and male students attended on the other three days. Male professors were also barred from teaching female students, and conversely, female professors were barred from teaching male students.
Continuing its restrictions on the education of women and girls, the Taliban, in the first week of October 2022, when university entrance exams began, limited the fields of study available to female students. Under this restriction, women and girls were barred from choosing agriculture, veterinary science, construction and mining engineering, and economics on the university entrance exam, and in some provinces, journalism as well. Two weeks later, the Taliban issued announcements at Kabul University stating that female students were also barred from continuing their studies at the master’s level in fields such as agriculture, business, computer science, and engineering.
A letter sent by the Taliban’s Ministry of Higher Education (MoHE) to public and private universities stated that, based on a cabinet decision of the group dated December 19, 2022, the continuation of girls’ education was “suspended until further notice.” This letter was issued under the signature of Neda Mohammad Nadeem, the Taliban’s acting minister of higher education, and stressed the immediate implementation of this order.
After coming to power, the Taliban’s Ministry of Higher Education (MoHE), under the label of a “14 percent reduction and downsizing of staff,” collectively dismissed several female professors from their positions, an action that ultimately led to the complete elimination of women’s presence at universities.
You can read the Persian version of this report here:
