The Hijab Controversy

Muslim Women’s identity amidst religion and the State https://theleaflet.in/muslim-womens-identity-amidst-religion-and-the-state/ HASINA KHAN·MARCH 8, 2023
Extracts: 

Post the 1992 Mumbai communal riots, when the Muslim community collectively faced aggression from the right-wing on the pretext of their identity, most Muslims assimilated to project their religious force against the right-wing’s attack. This assimilation caused division between the religious groups trying to conserve Muslim identity, and another group voicing concerns over the lack of welfare schemes, education and employment opportunities for Muslims and their socio-economic backwardness... We have witnessed the criminalisation of the Triple Talaq debate through which the State aimed to protect Muslim women from supposed regressive practices. This criminalisation portrays Muslim women as mute spectators incapable of taking their own decisions.

Five years later, the hijab row in Karnataka highlights the relationship between politics, culture and religion. The State has been incompetent in providing affirmative action to increase Muslim women’s participation in the workforce. It has removed scholarships for minority students, such as the Maulana Azad fellowship for research scholars. Instead, the priority has been to impose a uniform code of conduct in educational institutions, which paves the way for a code of conduct for Muslim women in Indian society.

The idea of one nation, language and code of conduct devoid of religious affinity seems utopian and beautiful, but is dangerous in the Indian context, as I believe the singularity connotes majoritarian, right-wing, Hindu values...

Hijab row shows why we should see Muslim women’s rights through the dual lens of religion and gender  https://theleaflet.in/hijab-row-shows-why-we-should-see-muslim-womens-rights-through-the-dual-lens-of-religion-and-gender/ 

The issues formed in this case come from a place of patriarchal, religious ideology. It questions whether the hijab is an essential religious practice. This line of questioning and forming the issues takes away autonomy from Muslim women to make decisions on their religion, cultural practice and personal expression. It then becomes a question of what is allowed by the religion.

However, Muslim women and girls, just like any other women, are diverse. Some may opt to wear the hijab while some may not. Some may profess their faith (openly), while others might be agnostic or atheistic. Despite this, the affiliation in society due to name and other identity categories would put all the women as Muslim. ..

the many ways in which intersectional discrimination against Muslim women manifests – whether in criminal justice system, employment laws or labour laws. It comes from prejudices and stereotypes of Muslim women made out of a cookie cutter mould – cut within the strict religious tenets of Islam. This denies the wide diversity Muslim women in India showcase, reclaiming dignity through their bravery and autonomy: from the way Bilkis Bano fought her case courageously in courts, to Muslim women leading the protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 in 2019-20, to an organisation led by a Muslim woman highlighting the discrimination in employment practices faced by Muslim women.

Women’s rights are diverse; similarly Muslim women’s issues are diverse. A homogenous understanding of our rights is a disservice to the plurality of the Indian population.

this series covers then hijab ban hearings at the Supreme Court in India.

Discrimination in the criminal justice system,

Parts I https://theleaflet.in/portrait-of-a-modern-indian-muslim-woman-bilkis-bano-and-the-criminal-justice-system/ Portrait of a modern Indian Muslim woman: Bilkis Bano and the criminal justice system
ALMAS SHAIKH·AUGUST 22, 2022

II  https://theleaflet.in/targeting-a-minority-within-the-minority-through-digital-crime-perpetuates-power-imbalance/  Targeting a minority within the minority through digital crime perpetuates power imbalance
ALMAS SHAIKH·AUGUST 26, 2022

inherent bias in the employment practices, against Muslim women., and 

Part III  https://theleaflet.in/overcoming-hiring-bias-towards-substantive-equality-in-employment-for-muslim-women/ Overcoming hiring bias: Towards substantive equality in employment for Muslim women
ALMAS SHAIKH·SEPTEMBER 5, 2022

Category: The Hijab Controversy

https://thewire.in/communalism/people-think-no-woman-could-wear-a-hijab-out-of-choice-stories-of-everyday-discrimination 

On September 20, 2022, the government of Karnataka told the Supreme Court that Muslim girls in Udupi were goaded into wearing a hijab to school by the Popular Front of India (PFI) through social media messages. The state government made the argument while responding to a petition challenging the ban on wearing a hijab to school imposed by Karnataka, and upheld by the state high court. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta told the apex court that wearing a hijab was part of a ‘larger conspiracy’ orchestrated by the PFI to create social unrest.

On October 13 this year, the Supreme Court of India delivered a split verdict on pleas challenging the Karnataka high court order that had upheld the ban. A constitutional bench comprising the Chief Justice of India will now examine whether Muslim girls can or cannot wear a head scarf in school.

As on December 1 this year, there were 69,598 cases pending before the Supreme Court. Out of this, 488 matters are before constitutional benches, which means that they are being heard by five-, seven- or nine-judge benches. The backlog includes petitions challenging the Modi government’s Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2019, pleas challenging the government’s decision to dilute Article 370 of the Constitution and petitions challenging the constitutional validity of demonetisation. All these pleas have been pending for more than two years. Despite the urgency of matters that have been placed on the back burner, the apex court is being forced to spend its time deciding whether schoolgoing Muslim girls can get an education while wearing a head scarf, a tradition some Muslims believe is integral to their faith.

The ban on wearing a hijab in classrooms may have highlighted the Karnataka government’s intolerance towards minorities, but the bias against the head scarf, it seems, is an old one. Muslim women who wear hijabs claim they are used to disapproving glares and people dismissing them as backward and uneducated.

by Seemi Pasha

21/12/2022

Category: The Hijab Controversy

Why it leaves me, a Left-Liberal, at odds with me, a Progressive Muslim  Javed Anand https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/supreme-court-verdict-on-hijab-split-wide-open-8207010/

Justice Dhulia noted the main thrust of his judgment was that the entire concept of essential religious practice was not essential to the dispute. The high court took a wrong path. According to him, it is ultimately a matter of choice and Articles 14 and 19. “The foremost question in my mind was the education of the girl child. Are we making her life any better?” He also held the view that the judgment in the Bijoe Emmanuel case “squarely covers the issue”. This refers to the 1986 ruling of the apex court that upheld the fundamental right of three school-going children from the Jehovah’s Witness sect to stand respectfully but not join others in singing the national anthem during the school assembly as it conflicted with the tenets of their faith. ..

The Liberal Me has no doubt that Justice Dhulia’s views are in consonance with constitutional values. But the Progressive Muslim Me fears that were a larger bench to subsequently rule accordingly, it would effectively strengthen the regressive sections among Indian Muslims...As is public knowledge, cutting across sectarian divides — Sunni, Shia, Barelvi, Deobandi, Wahhabi, Salafi, Maududian — virtually the entire Muslim clergy in India is of the view that hijab (niqab, burqa) is mandatory in Islam. The abstract principle of a woman’s freedom to choose, I fear, will feed into the it-is-mandatory argument; act as convenient cover for Islam’s patriarchs to keep, even push, women behind the veil...

Two, do Muslim girls studying in Muslim-run schools, 3-year-olds included, have the right to choose or they simply must conform?

In the event that the March order of the Karnataka High Court is struck down by a larger bench of the Supreme Court in the coming period, we might ponder on what students committed to Hindutva politics will make of the right to choose verdict. Classrooms becoming the new arena for competitive communalism? Muslim girls in hijab, Hindu boys in saffron scarves? Diversity, anyone?

Hijab Judgment of Supreme Court | सर्वोच्च न्यायालय का हिजाब पर फ़ैसला | Faizan Mustafa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83qGIZE0z70
Oct 14, 2022 Some comments on Youtube: Matir Manush We thank Dr. Faizan Mustafa as usual for his dedication to explain the matter of law to us with commitment and devotion. Justice Gupta expressed his opinion on the practice of Hijab with sincere reasoning. But we believe he failed to realize a simple matter.
Wearing Hijab is not harming or hurting anybody. It is not even disrupting the uniformity in the education places. But banning hijab is surely damaging one's freedom of personal choice. Banning hijab is shattering one's dream of education.
..justice Dhulia's verdict protect the integrity of our constitution. His judgement promotes the right of education of the girls. In other words the judgement of justice Dhulia is helping our girls to acquire knowledge which is very important for the nation. Our girls are a vulnerable group of people in the country. The judicial system should not and must not increase their vulnerability.

Rohit gupta New doctrines are laid down like trust doctrine, cross obligations and tolerance, laying down new dimensions of constitutional interpretation.
The question is of acoustomed to other way of living and there are countries, who have no school dress

Yazdy Palia I disagree with the line of reasoning. In their enthusiasm, the petitioner, the respondent and the judges, have not realised, that, the only issue in this case is
1. Does an institution, in India, has the right to frame their own rules?
2. Do the students and their supporters, have the right to impose their will on the institution created by individuals to educate children? It appears that all the three are competing with each other to violate fundamental rights.

Category: The Hijab Controversy

[Hijab Case] Karnataka High Court judgment hurtful, deeply offensive: Senior Advocate Colin Gonsalves argues before Supreme Court 
.https://www.barandbench.com/news/litigation/hijab-case-karnataka-hc-judgment-hurtful-deeply-offensive-colin-gonsalves-argues-supreme-court   "Parts of the judgment are deeply offensive to those who follow Islam, and it's contrary to at least three landmark judgments of this court", he said. He urged the court to consider remanding the case to the High Court for it to be heard again by a different bench reasoning that it did not conform to the kind of constitutional independence that it ought to have.

"I will show ten short points on how the judgment is on the perception of the majority. Where the minority point of view has been seen wrongly. It's basically a majoritarian judgment."

Category: The Hijab Controversy