An Afghanistan beyond politics

Veteran journalist, writer and photographer Nazes Afroz will present glimpses of Afghanistan that have never made headlines or caught media attention. For more than four decades, Afghanistan featured in the international media only for the wars, unrest and its instability. A series of events, starting from 1978, have traumatised the ordinary Afghans, displaced them in huge numbers, brutalised them. Contrary to the popular narrative, these events were not their making. Because of its strategic geographical location, Afghanistan has been caught in the web of geo-politics for centuries, and the ordinary Afghans continue to pay the price with their lives. Nazes Afroz will present nuggets of the stories of these ordinary Afghans who he has met and befriended during more than a decade of his engagement with Afghanistan.

Nazes Afroz is a renowned print and broadcast journalist. Of his career spanning over 40 years, 14 were spent with the BBC in London where he held the positions of the Executive Editor for South and Central Asia and the Editor of International Operations. Since 2013, Nazes has been based in Delhi, publishing widely on South Asian regional politics.

He has published the book, 'In a Land Far from Home: A Bengali in Afghanistan' (Speaking Tiger, 2015, which is a translation of the distinguished author Syed Mujtaba Ali's epic book Deshe Bideshe. The book is now being republished in the UK by John Murray Press. His other publications include a co-authored book on Afghan culture (Kuperad, London) and numerous articles and essays.

In addition, Nazes has been a keen photographer for decades documenting various communities, and his photographs have appeared in numerous publications and on the BBC and al-Jazeera websites. One of his photography projects documents the famous 'Kabuliwalas', titled 'From Kabul to Kolkata: Of Belonging, Memories and Identity', and has been exhibited in Kabul, Delhi, Dhaka and Kolkata, Washington DC, and at SOAS in London. The Alliance Francaise of Delhi has held Nazes' solo photography exhibition 'Behind the Veil: The Other Afghanistan' in 2015. His photography on the jute mill workers of West Bengal, India, has been exhibited at Scotland's Jute Museum@Verdant Works in Dundee in 2016.

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