By: Rukhshana Media
The Taliban’s Directorate of Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice in Herat have forced the owners of 82 wedding halls to sign a commitment letter based on which they will not allow anyone to play music during the wedding parties anymore, sources said.
One source, who is the owner of a wedding hall, said the Taliban warned if they catch anyone playing music in the wedding halls, “the owner of the hall, groom, and the groom’s father will be detained and imprisoned.”
The owner of the hall, who spoke on the condition that we don’t publish his name, said the Taliban ordered that no man, even the groom himself, isn’t allowed to visit the female section of the wedding hall.
In Afghanistan, the weddings were already gender-segregated, but male family members of both the bride and groom could visit the female section.
The second source, who is also the owner of a wedding hall in Herat, said the Taliban warned that “their intelligence is strong, and they will find out if we secretly play music in wedding halls,” and if they catch us the punishment will be “imprisonment and the closure of the hall.”
He, like the first source, spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The new restrictions will affect the wedding hall businesses negatively as they are already going through an economic downturn since the Taliban’s return to power in August.
The Taliban banned music during its first rule in the 1990s. Since returning to power for the second time, their fighters have closed music schools, smashed music instruments, and punished and humiliated the musicians and singers across Afghanistan.
Hundreds of musicians, singers and artists have fled the country in the past year.
