Yasmin Nigar Khan became the President of All India Pakhtoon Jirga-e-Hind in 1996
Yasmin Nigar Khan, the great-granddaughter of "Frontier Gandhi" Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, today said that she has been receiving SOS calls from Pakhtoons across India, urging her to request the Ministry of External Affairs to ensure the safety of their families after the Taliban takeover of their country.
Ms Khan (50), who lives in central Kolkata, is the president of the All India Pakhtoon Jirga-e-Hind, the community's top body in the country.
"We are in constant touch with the central and West Bengal governments, but the situation is fluid and very little information is trickling in from Afghanistan. Phone lines are jammed and visuals from Kabul are disturbing. Those living in India are distraught," Ms Khan, who said she has barely slept in the last two nights, told news agency PTI.
1,000-odd Pakhtoons in the state and lakhs living in other parts of the country for generations have no chance of returning to their native place but almost everyone has relatives in Afghanistan or north-western Pakistan, she said.
"They regularly spoke with their relatives in Afghanistan till even a few months back but they are unable to contact them now. Whatever little information they are getting is through those living in Pakistan. Many of their family members have been killed in the aggression of Taliban, which is a monstrous force with no respect for liberty, dignity and freedom of women," Ms Khan said.
"During the previous Taliban rule, they kidnapped young widows to marry them off to their members. They don't want girls to study or go to school. What they describe as Islamic law is in fact a travesty of the religion. Don't girls study in madrassas? Even in Islamic countries, women are encouraged to get modern education and work alongside men. The Taliban wants to take women back to medieval ages," she said.
Her great-grandfather had set up a school for girls in the present-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan in 1921. "The school has been closed now. I don't know what will happen to it later," she said.
Ms Khan said that her organisation will approach the United Nations to intervene in the humanitarian crisis. The outfit was formed by Frontier Gandhi's adopted grandson Lala Jaan Khan in 1949 and Yasmin Nigar Khan became its head in 1996.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)