In 1992, Afghan Singh (a pseudonym) was one member of the significant Hindus and Sikhs community in Kabul’s Kart-e Parwan area who lived a harmonious life and ran successful businesses. Back then, each family in this community possessed two-three vehicles, a fact that testifies to their medium-class economic status. Afghan Singh and his fellow community members never thought a sudden turn of events would take away from them all of their belongings and leave them with no other options but to think about saving their lives. “It was not more than three or four months since the Mujahidin regime took over that coercion, usurpation and looting began.” Afghan Singh explains the turn of events in a grim tone. “They broke into people’s homes and scared them with Kalashnikovs (AK-47).Their purpose was clear—coercion and extortion. They would forcibly take individuals out of their home and would ask for a hundred, two hundred or five hundred afghanis as ransom. More than half of the bullies were from a particular province, and another thirty-forty percent, including Anwar Dangar, were from the north.”
Thirty Stories of Agony- Hindu & Sikh Exodus [English]
