Thaindian News

June 5, 2010 (Pen Men at Work): Two Afghan girls, Khadija Rasoul, 13, and Basgol Sakhi, 14, from the village of Gardan-I-Top, Dulina district of Ghor province, in central Afghanistan were caught in a bus, by a policeman, for escaping their forced marriages to much older men. They were expecting the law to be on their side, but instead they were handed over to their husbands, only to get flogged on January 12.

The two girls, disguised in boy’s clothing, had been fleeing for two days along bumpy roads and over the mountain passes and had made it to the comparatively liberal Herat Province, where they were arrested by a policeman. Although Herat shelters the assaulted and runaway women and girls, the police informed the former warlord, Fazil Ahad Khan, a self-appointed commander and moral enforcer of Ghor province, and surrendered the girls to him.

After a short trial by Mr.Khan and the local religious leaders, the girls were sentenced to 40 lashes each. The video showed the mullah administering the punishment with a leather strap with as much force as possible, hitting each girl on her legs and buttocks with a sickening sound every time. The heavy red winter chadors were pulled over their heads, therefore only their skirts left to protect them from the blows.

The spectators were mostly camouflage uniform wearing armed men, and at least three of them openly videotaped the floggings. But no women were present there.

The mullah flogged the girls so hard that at one point he hurt his hand and handed over the strap to another man. The victims were ordered to stand still, which they did throughout. Only one girl could be seen in tears, when her face was briefly exposed to view.. When the second girl was flogged an old man filled in for the mullah, but his strokes appeared less forceful, so the mullah took the strap back. The spectators were counting the lashes out loud, but seemed to lose counts and had to start all over again After the beating was over they appreciated each other for such a ‘good job’.

The case was noteworthy for the failure of the authorities to protect the girls, despite having opportunities to do so. Khadija and Bagsol, later complained that their husbands used to beat them when they tried to defend themselves from the forceful unions.

The two child brides appeared to be among the few luckier ones here, as the mullah declared them divorced and returned them to their own families, after the flogging.