The Taliban's Education Ministry outlined plans for the new academic year this week without a single mention of girls' secondary enrollment, effectively confirming that Afghanistan remains the only country on Earth that bars half its population from education beyond sixth grade. [1]

Approximately 2.5 million girls have been banned from secondary school since the Taliban reimposed the prohibition in March 2022. [2] The regime has called the ban "temporary" in diplomatic settings while simultaneously codifying restrictions on women's public life into the August 2024 Virtue and Vice Law, which grants morality police sweeping enforcement authority. The contradiction is not subtle — it is structural.

UNICEF estimates that roughly 397,000 additional girls are blocked from continuing their studies with each passing academic year, a compounding toll that erases two decades of educational progress built with international funding. [2] Before the Taliban's return, girls' enrollment in secondary education had reached historic highs, and women constituted a growing share of university graduates and medical professionals.

Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai, in rare public remarks, called on the Taliban to reopen schools for girls, joining a chorus of international voices that has grown louder but produced no measurable result. [1] UNICEF and UNESCO issued a joint statement in January warning that the education system is "on the brink of collapse," with 93 percent of children at end of primary school unable to read at grade level.

The signals of reversal persist. The reversal itself does not.

-- PRIYA SHARMA, Delhi