For some, the transit denied in life came only after death.
When their mother died of a respiratory disease at a hospital in Delhi, Maryam and her brother spent two weeks shuttling between the Pakistani mission to ask for visas, the Indian government to seek clearances and the Afghan Embassy to help push those requests through.
Understand the Taliban Takeover in Afghanistan
Card 1 of 6
Who are the Taliban? The Taliban arose in 1994 amid the turmoil that came after the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan in 1989. They used brutal public punishments, including floggings, amputations and mass executions, to enforce their rules. Here’s more on their origin story and their record as rulers.
Who are the Taliban leaders? These are the top leaders of the Taliban, men who have spent years on the run, in hiding, in jail and dodging American drones. Little is known about them or how they plan to govern, including whether they will be as tolerant as they claim to be. One spokesman told The Times that the group wanted to forget its past, but that there would be some restrictions.
At night, the siblings survived on instant noodles and slept in a cramped room. During the day, they went to the morgue to plead for extensions to keep the body of their mother there.
The family’s trip to India was meant to be a happy moment for the mother and daughter.
Maryam, once a child bride, was drawing on the earnings of her new job as a lawyer — and savings from the sale of pine nuts — to pay for treatment for her mother, whose suffering had begun long before her bouts of tuberculosis and Covid-19. Like her daughter, she had also been a child bride who lost her first husband to the war while pregnant.
Maryam once worked as an office cleaner during the day, raised three children and took evening literacy classes to finish high school. After graduating with a law degree six months ago, she had gotten a job defending victims of abuse in one of the most conservative parts of southeastern Afghanistan.
When Kabul fell, Maryam thought about sending her mother and brother home while she stayed behind to explore asylum options. She had faced threats because of her job even before the Taliban; one colleague was assassinated outside the apartment building where they all lived.