Supported by its generous donors, the Bayat Foundation has assisted Afghanistan in restoring its social service infrastructure through the construction of schools and orphanages and the provision of vital mobile medical clinics. The foundation counts the restoration of the Rabia Balkhi Hospital’s surgical maternity ward, with its installation of modern equipment and a more comfortable post-surgery area, among its recent such efforts. Officials from the hospital and Afghanistan’s health ministry joined Bayat Foundation representatives in the grand opening event.
Located in the capital of Kabul, Rabia Balkhi Hospital is named in honor of the semi-legendary Rabia Balkhi, who some scholars call the first female poet to write in New Persian. Although the precise dates of her birth and death remain a mystery, there is evidence that she was born in Balkh in the region of Khorasan in what is now part of present-day Afghanistan. She also appears to be a contemporary of the poet Rudaki, who served as a court poet to the emir. In any case, Rabia Balkhi is one of only two female Persian writers of medieval times to appear in the historical record by name.
Some of the legends surrounding her include the story that she was in love with her brother’s Turkish-born slave and that her brother, Hares, learned of her secret and imprisoned the slave in a well. Hares then murders Rabia by cutting her throat; as she lay dying, she inscribed her final few poems on a wall in her own blood. Baktash, her beloved, managed to free himself from the well and avenge Rabia’s murder by assassinating her brother before killing himself.
Rabia Balkhi’s name is also attached to a contemporary girls’ high school, and girls throughout the country continue to venerate her memory as an example of a gifted, proud, and independent woman.