Anita Kazimi Haidary ’14 went back to her home in Afghanistan last summer with a undeveloped goal to start a school, but what she ended up doing was no less challenging.  A film and computer science double major at Mount Holyoke College, she now works from her base in South Hadley, Massachusetts to oversee the progress of an organization she founded six months ago half way across the world.

With Noorjahan Akbar, Haidary started a grassroots organization called Young Women for Change (YWC) that aims to address problems that women face in Afghanistan. According to Haidary, the organization’s mission is “to help increase the political, social, economic and cultural participation of women across the country.” This is especially relevant in Afghanistan where culturally rooted patriarchy and the threat of the anti-women Taliban movement still remains. Young Women for Change recently received official non-profit organization status in Afghanistan, as well as its first major grant of $41,000 from the United States Embassy to conduct research on sexual harassment.

During the winter break of her first year, Haidary first became acquainted with Akbar, a music and literature double major at Dickinson College, at a dinner in Northampton, MA. They met the following summer back home in Afghanistan, to move towards forming a women’s rights organization. “We wanted to start by finding women who wanted to work and who are passionate about volunteering,” Haidary said. Their organization’s first meeting, which was advertised through Facebook, brought together 75 women. “So while we were talking about schools, we got to talking about problems, women’s rights and about what urgently needed work.” This rather organic process resulted in an organized march against street harassment, carried out under the banner of “Young Women for Change,” which later acquired a  group of 25 dedicated members.

According to Haidary, Afghan women face harassment in the streets ranging from verbal abuse and comments on appearance to touching and physical abuse in crowded areas. Haidary explains this behavior as a symptom of the 30 years of war in Afghanistan, during which female figures were absent from public spaces. “They grew up with the idea of women being at home all the time,” said Haidary. “After the Taliban period, women were back in jobs and society. They internally think why people who are supposed to be at home are out like that.”

On July 14, 2010, 50 women and men marched from Kabul University to the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission holding up signs that read “These streets are mine too,” and “Islam forbids men from insulting women,” and passed out flyers. “We had guys walk with us, which was amazing,” said Haidary. The march, titled “Advocacy for Dignity,” was the first of its kind and received tremendous national and international media attention. The BBC and Reuters were among the news outlets covering the march. “Nobody sees it as a problem, and that is the problem,” Haidary said. The march succeeded in creating dialogue around the topic in the media and made the presence of YWC felt in Kabul. “At that moment, I felt like there are no limits to doing things,” Haidary said.

The recognition of YWC as an official nonprofit organization was a surprise to Haidary not only because of how quickly it was processed, but also because of the hurdles they overcame. “We faced a lot of problems. People wouldn’t hear what we were saying, we were sent from here to there, the bureaucratic stuff,” Haidary said. “I think we were too tough to give up. Our members were just too great. We did everything they asked for, so they had no reason to reject it.” According to Haidary, the volunteers who comprise the organization participate because they realize that nobody else is going to do this work for them. Many who joined YWC did not previously have an activist background. “We are very diverse—from different backgrounds, religions, statuses, but our mission unites us.” She says that what the YWC is “fighting for is not taking off your hijab. We are fighting for choice, equality. If you want to be able to work, you should be able to work.”

Young Women for Change has since produced radio commercials about street harassment, organized monthly lectures and a variety of advocacy and charity work. It has also incorporated men into the movement through the formation of a Male Advocacy group under the YWC umbrella. In November, professional researchers with YWC trained volunteers on qualitative research methods so they could work at 36 universities to conduct the first large scale study ever on sexual harassment in Afghanistan.

Even with her passion for activism, Haidary hopes to add media and filming to her list of activities. Besides working on a short documentary, she enjoys hosting her weekly world music show at WMHC radio called “We Play it All.” She balances these hobbies with her classes, YWC work and a job as a technology assistant at the college’s library. It doesn’t stop there: she finds every opportunity to share Afghan culture with the campus and engage fellow students in her cause. Haidary can be silly and talkative, but her seriousness and ‘no fuss’ work ethic aids her in juggling her roles. She is a woman with a plan, and rarely is Afghanistan not a part of it.

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