Tajikistan: Some marriages end in a burst of anger, others with a whimper. Marina Dodobayeva's ended with an SMS. The 33-year-old mother of two was sweeping her yard one October morning when her mobile phone vibrated with a three-word text message from her husband of 14 years. “Talaq talaq talaq,” it read —divorce, divorce, divorce. With those words, Dodobayeva found herself among the growing ranks of women in predominantly Muslim Tajikistan whose husbands have used mobile phones to issue the “triple taloq.” Dodobayeva immediately called her husband, who was working in Russia as a laborer, for an explanation. “He told me not to call him any more,” Dodobayeva said, “because now he has a new family.” Many Tajik marriages are undocumented, meaning it's impossible to say how many divorces have been carried out by SMS. But religious authorities say they have seen a soaring number of digitally dumped women visiting mosques with desperate pleas for help and guidance.
