Educated women suffer in Tajikistan

Opinion: June 4, 2012 at 12:00a.m.

By Haramgul Qodir

Institute for War & Peace Reporting

DUSHANBE, Tajikistan

Gulnoza Kabirova’s dream of attending nursing college ended when her family decided the 17-year-old’s chances of getting married would be harmed if she pursued a college education.

Her mother, Gulandom, who has raised 13 children in the village of Vahdat in southern Tajikistan, insisted she had her daughter’s best interests at heart.

“I see (the example) of girls in the neighborhood who are educated. Years go by and no one wants them as daughters-in-law. That was my worry, and that is why I didn’t allow my daughter to go to study,” she said.

So instead of paying the $600 in college fees, Gulandom borrowed $7,000 in order to pay for her daughter’s wedding. She still owes $3,000 on the loan.

“I’d rather cope with the difficulties of repaying the loan than face the situation of no one wanting to marry my daughter,” she said. “These days it is difficult to marry off young people.”

In Tajikistan, women are expected to move in with their husband’s extended family and submit to the authority of the men and other members of the household after they are married.

An educated woman is perceived as less likely to be submissive. In addition, a woman with an education, villagers fear, will not be willing to work in the fields, do the housework and care for the children and elderly. In case of divorce, an educated woman is better able to defend her legal rights.

Most women here are expected to marry by the age of 20. Women older than that are considered undesirable.

Rustam Akramov, a sociologist, says it’s easy to understand why families are reluctant to allow their daughters to pursue an education.

Matter of control

“In rural areas, young men prefer to marry young girls with no schooling, or who attended for only a few years and then stopped, because it is easy to control them,” he said. While men and women are considered equal under the law, custom and tradition dictates that few women have property and inheritance rights.

Adding to the pressure to wed is the shortage of eligible bachelors in the country. Many young men were killed during the civil war that ravaged the country between 1992 and 1997. Since then, many young men immigrated to Russia in search of work.

Munira Rozikova, 37 and single, knows the price that’s paid for being an educated woman.

“(Families) don’t want us as daughters-in-law. In our village, educated girls are considered to have libertine attitudes,” said Rozikova, who attended medical school and is now the village’s physician.

Sometimes Rozikova, who still lives with her mother and siblings, has second thoughts about having acquired a medical degree. And even though she’s proud of her daughter’s achievements, her mother, Manzura Boboeva, worries about her daughter’s future. After all, Rozikova’s brothers could turn her out after their mother dies.

“Where would she go? I often hear my neighbors criticizing my daughter, saying she is still unmarried, and blaming her education for it,” Boboeva said.

Family opposition

Even when young men are attracted to women pursuing an education, they’re likely to face opposition from their families.

Karim, 24, said he’d fallen in love with a fellow student he’d met while studying at a university. But his family is dead-set against the match.

“I didn’t know what to do,” he said. “I needed to have (my family’s) consent and blessing.”

Muhammad, 24, faced the same situation when his family rejected his plan to marry his medical student girlfriend. Not only did Muhammad’s mother object to his girlfriend pursuing an education, his brothers warned that, at 24, she was already past her prime.

Mohammad says he hopes to marry her anyway, despite his family’s objections.

Haramgul Qodir is a reporter in Tajikistan who writes for The Institute for War & Peace Reporting, a nonprofit organization in London that trains journalists in areas of conflict. Distributed by MCT Information Services.