Feb 11, 2022: An interim order passed by a court in the southern Indian state of Karnataka has advised students against wearing “religious garments” pending final verdict on a petition filed against the ban on Muslim female students from wearing the hijab in colleges.
According to India’s NDTV, the Karnataka High Court on Thursday said the matter would be re-heard on Monday to decide whether it could order school and college students not to wear hijab in classrooms.
The judge hearing the case was quoted as saying while referring it to a panel of judges to be led by the chief justice of the Karnataka High Court, “These matters give rise to certain constitutional questions of seminal importance in view of certain aspects of personal law,”
The ban on headscarves or hijabs in schools has caused a stir among Muslims in southern India, and large crowds have taken to the streets to protest the ban. Ongoing tensions in the state of Karnataka have raised concerns among the minority community about what they say is increasing persecution under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government.
The state machinery looks helpless in front of the saffron scarf group. Instead, some members of the ruling party are issuing statements in defense of the hijab ban, encouraging RSS members to escalate the situation.
In an incident in a video widely shared online, a lone Muslim student wearing a hijab was surrounded by Hindu male youths chanting religious slogans as she tried to enter her school in Karnataka.
The government of Karnataka, where 12% of the population is Muslim and is ruled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has said in an order that students should abide by the dress code set by schools.
Meanwhile protests have also been planned for Wednesday in India’s capital New Delhi.
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