KABUL (SW) – A number of musicians at Kabul’s famous music alley, Kocha Kharabat, say that they are suffering from hunger these days.
Nadim Bakhsh, the grandson of Ustad Rahim Bakhsh, the head of the Kabul Kocha Khabarat Association and one of the singers of traditional Afghan music, told Salam Watandar that after more than 50 years of working in the music sector, with the establishment of the Islamic Emirate, he was forced to stop humming and singing any songs. Complaining about the poverty, he said: “There were more than a thousand families of artists in this alley, of which only 300 families are left and now they have become unemployed due to the restrictions imposed by the Islamic Emirate, and we We want the Islamic Emirate to pay a stipend for the artists.”
Kocha Kharabat, which is the standard bearer of Afghanistan’s traditional music and has nurtured many masters has fallen into silence these days.
Mukhtar, a local singer who is the head of his family of six, said that after the rule of the Islamic Emirate, he became unemployed and every now and then he and his family spend days with hunger. “For several years, we participated in people’s happiness by playing music, and in this way, I provided my family with their food needs. But unfortunately now I am unemployed and occasionally at home, I have nothing to meet the food needs of my family.”
In the same way, Mohammad Ibrahim Afzali, who used to make musical instruments in Kocha Kharabat, after the establishment of the Islamic Emirate, opened a grocery store so that he could earn a few afghanis and provide for his family’s needs. After the return of the Islamic Emirate, a large number of singers left Afghanistan, or started doing hard labour jobs.
We wanted to include the opinion of the Ministry of Information and Culture in this report, but to no avail.
After returning to power, the Islamic Emirate has banned singing and playing music.
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