Several Jogi families in Badakhshan province, members of a semi-nomadic minority community, say they face economic hardship and lack access to healthcare and education. They also say people treat them in discriminatory ways. Most Jogis live in tents, and because they lack a fixed identity and follow a nomadic lifestyle, they periodically move from one city to another and from one province to another.
Sahib Jan, an elder of the Jogi community in Badakhshan, says: “We want to live like everyone else, with jobs and with our children in school.”
Gul Mohammad (pseudonym) lives with his family near Faizabad city. He says the lack of an identity card has kept him from finding steady work. He adds that without identity documents, he has also been unable to formally purchase land.
Sher Mohammad (pseudonym) says: “I wanted to enroll two of my children in school, but I could not, because they had no tazkira.” His greatest wish, he says, has been for his children to attend school so they would not be forced to live as he has.
He adds: “We consider ourselves people of Afghanistan, but many look at us as outsiders. Our blood was shed here from birth, and we have lived on this land’s water, air and soil; we belong to it.” He complains that Jogis often face taunts and insults in the city and in public places. “We don’t like living off others or begging,” he says, “but we have no farmland, no steady job and no fixed home. That is why we move from place to place and turn to charity and begging to survive.”
How the Jogis Make a Living
Sher Agha (pseudonym), a 20-year-old Jogi man, married two years ago and now has one child. Describing his work, he says: “This year I went to Raghistan district and worked at a gold mine for 300 Afghanis a day, but the work stopped, and I had to go home. Now I have neither work nor money to buy food. There’s no work in the city either, and even when work is available, they won’t hire us. They think local workers are better than Jogi workers.”
Bibi Gul (pseudonym) is one of the women in the community who earns a living through begging and fortune-telling, work she has done since she was 15. “My husband has died, and I have five children,” she says. “Every day I collect rice, flour,r and other food from people’s homes. Sometimes I read fortunes for women, and they give me 50 or 100 Afghanis, which we live on.”
Another Jogi woman reads palms and tells fortunes on the streets and in people’s homes, typically earning 20 to 100 Afghanis in return. She says that since the Taliban returned to power, its forces have cracked down on fortune-telling and palm-reading, and the trade is now in decline.
Limited Social Ties
Despite generations of life in Afghanistan, Jogis say their social ties with other ethnic and social groups remain limited. They attribute this partly to marriage largely within the community, a distinct way of life, and limited family ties beyond it. But some families also blame discrimination and rejection by parts of the wider society.
Farkhunda (pseudonym) says marriage between Jogis and outsiders is rare. “No one outside marries us,” she says, “because we have no name, no wealth and no education.”
Agha Shirin, 54, an elder among the Jogis in Faizabad, has lived in several Afghan provinces and has seen firsthand how limited these social ties can be. “We want close relations with other people, but their view of us has not changed,” he says. “They won’t eat our food, and they won’t form family ties with us.” He says Jogis want closer relationships with others, but discrimination stands in the way.
The Jogis live in a village called Kari near Faizabad, the provincial capital of Badakhshan. Several families reportedly live under tents on vacant land owned by someone else. They say summer, with its warmer weather, is easier than winter, when rain, snow and cold make life under canvas far harder.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) previously listed the Jogis, in its 2024-2027 protection and solutions strategy for Afghanistan, among groups at risk of statelessness and of difficulty obtaining identity documents. The agency said the absence of identity cards across generations, combined with a nomadic lifestyle, is among the barriers preventing these groups from securing identification and confirming their citizenship.
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