A Study On Girls’ Access To Education In Rural Ghazni, Afghanistan

Abstract

Girls’ education has experienced numerous ups and downs throughout history in Afghanistan. It has never been considered suitable, even before the three decades of civil war inAfghanistan. However, during the former Taliban rule from 1996 to 2001, girls were completely deprived of educational opportunities. Due to the Taliban's perception and their interpretation of Islam on women education, no girl was permitted to attend educational institutions during that period, resulting in zero participation of women in education. A new hope for the Afghan people was created in 2001 with the establishment of an interim administration and the support of the international community. Struggle for 20 long years on building infrastructure, including education, was going to bring a stable situation for women in terms of education and market places. However, unspecified decisions by the U.S. and evacuation of Afghanistan, set thecountry back on a fragile path; and women are deprived of educational opportunities again in thecountry. The present study is intended to know the attitude of Religious Scholars and Parents on the girls’ access to education in rural Ghazni, Afghanistan. Descriptive Survey method has been adopted in this study. A sample consisting of 200 individuals (25 Religious scholars, 175 Parents) has been taken from10 different villages of Andar district in Ghazni Province, Afghanistan. The sample has been selected using ‘Purposive sampling’ method initially to identify the province, the district and the villages in Afghanistan. Then the researcher selected the Religious scholars and Parents from Andar district at random using ‘Random sampling’ method for the present investigation. The data were collected using two questionnaires developed by the researchers for Religious scholars and parents separately. The data were analyzed using different statistical techniques like means, standard deviations, t-tests and f-ratios. The findings of the study revealed that the variables – gender and occupation of parents have no influence on their attitude towards girls’ access to education in Afghanistan. Further, the study revealed that the age and educational qualification of religious scholars have no influence on their attitude towards girls’ access to education in Afghanistan. The study suggested that there should be access to girls’ education in Afghanistan in general and in the rural areas of Afghanistan in particular.