Keralite vlogger says Afghan authorities threatened arrest over solo travel without male companion

A Keralite travel vlogger who sparked concern after claiming she had been “arrested” by “Mujahideen” in Afghanistan’s Bamyan has clarified that she was not ultimately arrested, but said local authorities threatened to detain her for travelling alone without a male companion or the required permits.

In a detailed clarification posted after her initial social media message, the vlogger, known as Backpacker Arunima, said she was travelling alone in Afghanistan when she reached Bamyan in the evening after taking a lift in a lorry.

She said it was around 7 pm and already dark when she arrived, prompting local residents to approach her because women are not permitted to travel alone at night in the country. She said they checked her passport and visa and asked where she planned to stay.

According to her account, an English-speaking man later arrived and took her to a hotel, where she found the room too expensive. She said she asked if she could pitch her tent somewhere instead, but was taken to another location. After being shown a place to put up her tent, she was offered a vacant room because of the cold weather, which she accepted.

She said two people later approached her while she was charging her phone and communicated with her using Google Translate. They asked where she had come from and demanded to see her permit.

The vlogger said she had previously travelled to Jalalabad to obtain a permit but was refused because she was travelling alone. According to her, officials told her that she would need to travel with a male companion or hire a guide before they could issue the permit, and asked her to return to Kabul.

After spending two days in Kabul, she resumed her journey and said she encountered several checkpoints. She claimed she had told officials at some of the checkpoints that a German friend was travelling with her but had gone to another province and would join her later, saying she feared she would otherwise be stopped from travelling.

In Bamyan, however, she said she could not maintain the story because she was alone. Officials checked her visa and found that she had entered Afghanistan on August 27 and had been travelling alone since then.

According to her account, the officials told her that she had violated the country's rules and threatened to arrest her. She said they also told her she would have to leave the country and that she had violated the rules by travelling without a permit for the province.

The vlogger said she immediately contacted her friend and began speaking to the officials through a translation app. She said she was shaking and did not know what to do as they repeatedly told her she had broken the law.

She then contacted the man who had brought her to the location. He returned after some time and spoke to the officials on her behalf, she said.

According to the vlogger, the officials initially insisted that she obtain a permit, hire a guide and pay 10,000 in local currency. She said she was also told that she would have to pay a fine because she had remained in the country without the required permission.

She told them she was leaving Afghanistan and travelling towards Uzbekistan. After negotiations, she said the officials eventually allowed her to leave for the next country without obtaining a permit.

Clarifying her earlier social media post, the vlogger said the incident was not a case of her being taken to a police station or jail. Rather, she said she had faced the threat of arrest and had been extremely frightened by the prospect of being detained.

She said she posted an Instagram story during the incident because she was panicking and hoped someone would come to her aid.

“Just because I am a woman, I had to go through all of this,” she said, adding that several male friends had travelled through Afghanistan without facing similar problems. She said female travellers she knew had travelled with either a guide or a male companion.

The vlogger said she planned to travel towards the Uzbekistan border, around 500 km away, the following day. She expected to encounter more checkpoints along the route and said she was still physically shaken by the stress of the incident.

She also said she had received numerous calls and messages after her initial post but was unable to respond immediately because she was feeling unwell.

The circumstances described by the vlogger could not be independently verified. There was no immediate official statement available on the incident.