#LetAfghanGirlsLearn

Silenced Dreams: The Unmatched Tragedy of Women and Girls in Afghanistan

An Emotional Tale of the Consequences of Taliban’s Ban on Girls and Women’s Education

A young Afghan girl sitting alone, staring blankly into a barren classroom. Books lay forgotten on the dusty floor, a silent testimony to the shattered dreams of education and a gloomy future — Art via Midjourney

A decade ago, when I was a teenager, I was working in India for a multinational firm focused on the development sector in post-conflict countries. As a teenager, I honed my computer and IT skills and put them to use in my role, which involved compiling and drafting technical reports, creating charts, and providing support to digitally illiterate technical consultants.

In the late Taliban years, when I was in primary school, growing up in Afghanistan under the Taliban regime was a challenge. They imposed strict interpretations of religion. We were heavily influenced by Arabic scholarly texts. They taught us to view the West as evil. Despite this, I was able to resist the brainwashing, thanks to my love for the English language, computers, and, importantly, Persian poetry. But my passion for technology was further fueled by my admiration for McGraw-Hill, a publisher whose books were unavailable in Afghanistan. Still, McGraw-Hill was my first love.

I recall a British woman who lived in our neighborhood in Kabul and worked for a development agency who gave me some of the…