The Afghanistan cricket team was the talk of the nation for its stellar show in the just-concluded World Cup. And now, the Bengal Global Business Summit has invited a unique speaker whose life and work will keep the state’s focus riveted on Afghans and Afghanistan at least for the next two days.
The seventh edition of the two-day BGBS, set to start on Tuesday, has invited former Afghan education minister Rangina Hamidi.
A US citizen, Hamidi, 45, presently teaches at the business school of Arizona State University. At the summit, she will narrate stories of grit and courage to inspire women entrepreneurs.
Till she left Kabul on August 15, 2021, after the Taliban took over, Hamidi was taking care of the education of the troubled nation.
Dedicated to the empowerment of women in Afghanistan, Hamidi’s bio on the website of Arizona State University’s Thunderbird School of Global Management states, among her many accomplishments, setting up “a full value-chain model of an all-women’s social enterprise in Kandahar whose products have reached Europe, the Middle East, Americas as well as other parts of the world”.
A source involved in organising the BGBS said Hamidi had been picked for her outstanding life story — both personal and professional — that would inspire women who have taken the entrepreneurial plunge.
“On a domain as hostile as Afghanistan and a life that saw her moving places and losing a family member in a terror attack, Hamidi’s life and work have been truly inspirational, cutting across gender lines,” the official said when asked about the reason for inviting her as the state guest to the flagship business summit of the Bengal government.
Hamidi was born in Afghanistan’s Kandahar in 1978 in a Pashtun family. Her father Ghulam Haider Hamidi was the Kandahar mayor till the Taliban killed him at the municipal office on July 27, 2011.
During her early years that saw the Soviets enter Afghanistan, Hamidi moved to Pakistan’s Quetta in 1981 for a few years and finally settled in the US, from where she earned her bachelor’s degree in religious studies, women and gender studies.
The graduate from the University of Virginia and a US citizen, Hamidi decided to return to her country of origin a year after Hamid Karzai became interim President of Afghanistan in 2002. She returned to Kandahar in 2003.
Till she was forced to leave the country in 2021, Hamidi worked on development projects, education and rights issues concerning women.