Esha Chanda,

Columnist (Our World)

 

A group that stirs up agitations, annihilates the society, slays in the name of religion, is the cause of indignation in the world, and yet manages to sustain itself every day.

An Islamist group that ruled Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001, Taliban’s vile acts have always caused waves across media and the world. A group that grew out of a student movement who were committed to purify Afghanistan, Taliban has been repetitively condemned internationally for their actions and injustice shown towards women. The ludicrous laws by this group have crippled the rights of women nation-wide.  Absurd regulations like ban on speaking out loud in a public place or voicing their opinions by appearing on any channels of communication (radio, magazine covers, books, films) pertain womanhood. These laws have impaired the freedom of females causing them to feel forlorn in a populated nation.

But the nation hasn’t entirely suspended expressing their sentiments. And the recent incident with Malala Yousafzai vouches for the same. A young 14-year-old girl who defied Taliban first when she was merely 11 years old, by inscribing her thoughts in an online diary under the pseudonym of ‘Gul Makai’ (corn flower in Urdu) for BBC Urdu.  Malala, then a seventh grade student gave an account of how the ban on girl education forced on Swat, a north western district in Pakistan, affected her and her fellow classmates. The diary of Malala narrates how the First Battle of Swat disturbed a young soul and how schools were shut down and some even blow up following the restrictions imposed by Taliban (reports say around 400 schools were destroyed between 2007 and 2011). One of the few brave voices that spoke out and didn’t deter at the thought of Taliban, Malala opposed the group’s edict on female education (this time around, the group had also restricted women from going to the market). She lived with the thought that she might not open her eyes to see the world the next day and with the risk of losing a close one in one of the incessant blasts that took place in the district. By shooting a youth in her head, Taliban has shown that they were threatened by a young voice.

She spoke in 2009 out of her passion towards education for girls. Her rebelliousness against Taliban led the masked gunman to trample her views by shooting her in the head and neck while she was travelling in the school bus. A Taliban spokesman has termed the group’s action as a lesson to be learnt for everyone who wishes to proliferate Malala’s thoughts and follow her footsteps. The group has criticised Malala’s actions by saying that she was infiltrating their culture with Western thoughts.

The absurdity of the entire incident is that Islam is strictly against punishing women or causing them any harm. The Taliban group that walks with their head held high by arming themselves with bullets and weapons of mass destruction broke the laws of their religion. For a group that claims to purify the nation by inculcating Islamic rules and laws, they ironically went against their own religion and riddled a young girl with bullets.