Images of vendors mutilating the heads of female figures with saws have already begun to circulate on social media.
The shops in the province of Herat have begun to cut the heads of the mannequins after the Taliban Government’s Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and Vice Prevention recommended that vendors implement the measure as they are considered figures against Islamic law.
“We told the merchants that if they want to show the clothes on the mannequins, they should cut off their heads, which will not create problems to display the clothes,” Shaikh Abdul Aziz, director of the Ministry of Propagation of Virtue and Vice Prevention.
According to Aziz, only by mutilating the figures will its use be acceptable, but “Covering the mannequins’ heads will not be enough.”
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We only “advise and suggest to the merchants that they cut out the faces of the mannequins,” added the Taliban regime official, clarifying that the mannequins have not been asked to destroy them completely.
For now, these new rules have been passed only to merchants in Herat, although since Afghanistan’s fall to Islamists last August, female figures have been disappearing from shop windows across the country.
“At this stage, our statement is only a recommendation, but over time if the traders did not consider the rules, we will deal with it based on our rules and regulations,” he explained.
The images of vendors mutilating the heads of female figures with saws began to circulate on social media, while several merchants confirmed the implementation of the measure for fear of punishment from the Taliban.
“We received the letter about the cutting of the heads of all the mannequins whether it is a man or a woman or a child and some of the merchants have already begun to cut the heads of the mannequins in their stores,” a vendor told Efe on condition of anonymity.
“The mannequin is a normal thing all over the world and Afghanistan, I have several clothing stores and around 50 mannequins that I use in my clothing stores cost me around 80 or 100 dollars each, but with this decision there will be a loss enormous”, said another merchant.
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The Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice was one of the most feared institutions in the first government of the Taliban in Afghanistan, between 1996 and 2001, remembered for the harsh measures that confined women at home, prohibited the reproduction of music, and harshly punished anything deemed outside of Islamic law.
The powerful institution it was extinguished after the fall of the regime with the American invasion, and for the next 20 years it was just a bad memory for Afghans.
The ministry, however, was reinstalled by the Taliban after their victory in the war, and its new headquarters now occupies what for the past two decades was the now-defunct Ministry of Women.
Since their reappearance, Taliban have advised taxi drivers not to transport women without veils, and they have also banned the broadcast of “immoral” films and removed female faces from shop windows. (I)
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