Masuma Esmati-Wardak

Masuma Esmati-Wardak
Masuma Esmati-Wardak
Minister of Education
Member of the House of the People
	In office; 1965–1969
Constituency	Kandahar

Masuma Esmati-Wardak was an Afghan writer and politician. She was jointly one of the first women to serve in the Afghan parliament and served as Minister of Education.

In 1953 she graduated from Kabul Women's College, and received a degree in business in the United States in 1958.[1]

In 1959, she and Kubra Noorzai became one of the first women to appear in public in Afghanistan without a veil after Queen Humaira Begum had removed hers, supporting the call by the Prime minister Mohammed Daoud Khan for women to voluntary remove their veil.[2]

In 1964 King Mohammed Zahir Shah appointed her to an advisory committee that reviewed the draft 1964 constitution,[3] which granted women the right to vote and stand for election. In 1965 she was elected to represent Kandahar in the House of the People of Parliament, and became a leading advocate of women's rights.[1][4] She was the only one of the four women elected in 1965 to run for re-election in 1969, but lost her seat.[5]

She married Abdul Qayum Wardak, a former minister of education and professor in the Science Faculty of Kabul University. In 1987 she became President of the Afghan Women's Council.[1]

References

Mattar, Philip (2004). Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East & North Africa: D-K. Macmillan Reference USA. p. 786. ISBN 978-0-02865-771-4.
Tamim Ansary (2012) Games without Rules: The Often-Interrupted History of Afghanistan
Sarfraz Khan (2013) Politics of policy and legislation affectin g women in Afghanistan: One step forward two steps back Central Asia Journal, Number 73
Skaine, Rosemarie (2001). The Women of Afghanistan Under the Taliban. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-78648-174-3.
Louis Dupree (2014) Afghanistan Princeton University Press, p653

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[mattar-1] Mattar, Philip (2004). Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East & North Africa: D-K. Macmillan Reference USA. p. 786. ISBN 978-0-02865-771-4.

[TA-2] Tamim Ansary (2012) Games without Rules: The Often-Interrupted History of Afghanistan

[3] Sarfraz Khan (2013) Politics of policy and legislation affectin g women in Afghanistan: One step forward two steps back Central Asia Journal, Number 73

[4] Skaine, Rosemarie (2001). The Women of Afghanistan Under the Taliban. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-78648-174-3.

[5] Louis Dupree (2014) Afghanistan Princeton University Press, p653