Ghulam Farooq Wardak | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Minister of Education | |
| In office 11 October 2008 – April 2015 | |
| Preceded by | Mohammad Hanif Atmar |
| Succeeded by | Assadullah Hanif Balkhi |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 1959 Wardak Province, Afghanistan |
| Political party | Hezbi Islami |
| Alma mater | Preston University |
Ghulam Farooq Wardak (born 1959) is a politician in Afghanistan, formerly serving as the Minister of Education. He was appointed to that position by Afghan President Hamid Karzai on October 11, 2008.[1]
Farooq Wardak was born in the Saydabad Wardak District, in the Wardak Province of Afghanistan. He is an ethnic Pashtun from the Wardak tribe, who is fluent in Pashto, Persian, English and Urdu.[2] His primary education was from a government elementary school in Wardak Province. He completed his high school in Kabul City. With the collapse of President Daud Khan's regime, Wardak joined the jihad against the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan with Hezb-e Islami of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.
Since the end of Taliban regime in late 2001, Farooq Wardak has continued to support Hezb-e Islami followers by appointing them to interesting administrative positions.
After Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Wardak stopped his studies in the faculty of Pharmacy of Kabul University and took refuge in Pakistan with the Afghan refugees. In 1982, he was admitted to the Faculty of Pharmacy in Punjab University, and graduated with a degree in 1986.[3] While working with the United Nations from 1996 to 2001 in Pakistan, he received a master's degree in Administration from Preston University, in Peshawar, Pakistan. He received an honorary doctorate from KIIT University in 2012, other recipients at the ceremony were eminent economist, Baidyanath Misra, and Jigme Thinley, the then Prime Minister of Bhutan.[4]