By Freshta Negah Abubakar Siddique | Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty |
When the Taliban seized power in 2021, there were concerns that some of Afghanistan’s tiny non-Muslim minorities could vanish.
Two years on, those fears are becoming realized. Afghanistan’s last-known Jew fled the country shortly after the Taliban takeover. Meanwhile, the Sikh and Hindu communities are believed to have shrunk to just a handful of families.
Under the Taliban, Sikhs and Hindus have faced severe restrictions, including on their appearances, and have been banned from marking their religious holidays in public, leaving many with no choice but to escape their homeland.
“I cannot go anywhere freely,” Fari Kaur, one of the last remaining Sikhs in the capital, Kabul, told RFE/RL’s Radio Azadi.
“When I go out, I’m forced to dress like a Muslim so that I can’t be identified as a Sikh,” she said, in reference to the Taliban’s order that all women must wear the all-encompassing burqa or niqab.
Kaur’s father was killed in a suicide attack targeting Sikhs and Hindus in the eastern city of Jalalabad in 2018. The attack reportedly led as many as 1,500 Sikhs to leave the country, including Kaur’s mother and sisters.
But Kaur refused to leave and stayed in Kabul to fulfil her father’s dream that she finish school.
In March 2020, 25 worshipers were killed when Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K) militants stormed a Sikh temple in Kabul. Following the attack, most of the remaining members of the minority left Afghanistan.
Again, Kaur refused to leave. But now, more than two years after the Taliban seized power, she said the lack of religious freedom under the militants has left her no choice but to seek refuge abroad.
“We have not celebrated our key festivals since the Taliban returned to power,” she said. “We have very few community members left behind in Afghanistan. We cannot even look after our temples.”
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