From the land of Khudai Khidmatgars

It was heartening to see the cheerful and determined faces of the young girls who were all set to "kick the ball" so to speak, in their first ever international football tournament. For many, coming out of the veil and the imposed constrictions of the Talib regime was such a welcome relief that one can see it in their shining eyes. Their coach tells them to cover their heads in front of the Television crews. And some oblige, some don't. A friendly match with a group of women from the "blessers" (as Aziz put it) was a preamble to the upcoming tournament in Islamabad. The girls win, however, their parents are afraid to send them to the tournament if they are going by road, for fear of a backlash by the Taliban. Finally, the coach manages to get some funding for their flight tickets. That the girls came only runners up is not the matter. But what strikes is the number of women football clubs in Pakistan. Ultimately one of the clubs in Pakistan won the tournament. For the afghan girls, its a disappointment, but their folks tell them, its a great feat that they managed to come thus far. Indeed, it seems so, when one sees the archival footage of the Taliban beating up women in Burquas, with their eyes hardly visible and the execution of a woman by Taliban in the same football ground where now the girls practice their game. "Afghan girls can kick", seems like a very "liberating film" as Jai Chandiram put it. Sure, but some thing was disturbing me - the film simply skims the "occupation" part. It doesn't show the "real reason" for the girls to get a blessing from their "occupants". It surely wasn't meant to kick the Taliban out. Interestingly, Azizullah calls them "Blessers".

However, he too had many reservations about the film - "The only image that people think about afghanistan is that of the Taliban. It is not that we became an open society only after 2001. Afghanistan was a very open society even prior to 1996. The Taliban was an accident in History. Yet, the only image shown in media is of Afghanistan a.k.a. Taliban". As I talked to him later, I had one major question, "What do you feel about the American occupation? Don't you see it as unfair that the Americans who created the Taliban in the first place are bombing your country now?' "We are happy to breathe easy. But its not that the Americans created Taliban. You see during the Russian occupation, a totally "godless society" was created. Taliban was a reaction to that other extremist ideology. The Americans saw an opportunity in this and helped the Taliban by supplying arms to them. So, its not totally black and white. But then, we don't like the integration of the Taliban into our society. We want to be away from them." "Is it happening now?" "Yes, since 2001, the process has been started".

"You see you all are living a free life here, but over there, ever 200 meters we see a Tank, sometimes destroyed. That is the state. You can never imagine what it is like. So you all are fortunate that you have so much freedom. But I feel upset with the way everyone associates Afghan people with the Taliban. We are not that. We are peaceful people. But we suffer because of that tag. Why here, we wanted to get a house on rent. We signed the agreement and just when we were about to move in, our landlord said, "sorry, we can't give you for rent". "Where was this?" "In Secunderabad, Tarnaka...its very difficult, the moment they know we are from Afghanistan, they shut the doors on us. Even in shops, they are very cold to us, when they hear that we are from Afghanistan, so when they ask us, where we are from, we end up saying that we are from central Asia - Uzbekistan or Tajikistan". "That's sad, its not just you, I used to see African students being denied places for rent, just because they are black", I added. "That's not their fault isn't it? God made them black. What can they do?" Aziz asked. "How are you treated in the Old City?" "Oh. There it is easier. People say, oh from Afghanistan, Muslim...etc. So the acceptance level is better", Aziz smiled.

"Before the Taliban how was it?" "It was a free society". "But that was during the communist rule, what about it before that?" "We had a democratic society, it was under our king. We had many women leaders who were at the forefront of our freedom struggle." I remembered the story of the Khudai Khidmatgars - Pathans from North West Frontier Province and Afghanistan, who under the influence of Frontier Gandhi, Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan, took to non-violent struggle against the British. That a warrior community has taken to non-violence, is one of the marvels of Indian history that is not truly mentioned in mainstream India.