58 girl students suspended for wearing Hijab, holding protest; govt says it didn't ban hijab

BENGALURU: Girl students in many parts of Karnataka were denied entry into their respective educational institutions on Saturday as they arrived in hijabs, despite a court order, as the issue showed no signs of abating after its flare-up about a fortnight ago that prompted the government to close down colleges and institutions for a couple of days.

As many as 58 students at Shiralakoppa in Shivamogga district who had refused to remove their hijab and staged a demonstration against the government pre-university college administration were suspended. They were suspended on Friday and were told that they should not come to the college, a student told reporters. On Saturday too, they came to the college, raised slogans and demanded their right to wear hijab. However, they were not let in. "We came here but the principal told us that we have all been suspended and there is no need for us to come to the college. Even police told us not to come to the college but we came here. Today, no one spoke to us," the students complained.

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Despite a government order and the Karnataka High Court's interim order restricting the students from wearing hijab or saffron scarves inside classrooms, the girls came to schools and colleges donning the headscarf. In the SJVP College at Harihar in Davangere district, girls wearing hijab were denied entry. The pupils refused to go inside without the scarf, stressing that it was as important as education and they cannot give up their rights. In Vijay Paramedical College in the Belagavi district, students complained to the reporters that a holiday was announced by the institution for an indefinite period due to the hijab issue.

"We will not sit without headscarves. Let the college realise how it affects our education. The principal is not listening to us," a student told the media. In Ballari, a group of girls were not allowed inside the Sarala Devi College, which has been witnessing protests from the day the controversy erupted and the government had ordered that no one should wear clothes that could disturb the peace, harmony and, law and order. The government college at Gangavathi in Koppal district too faced a similar situation where girls were not allowed inside the college.

In Kudur village in Ramanagara district, some students staged a demonstration on the college ground after they were not allowed to enter the classrooms. On January 1, six girl students of a college in Udupi attended a press conference held by Campus Front of India (CFI) in the coastal town protesting against the college authorities denying them entry into the classroom by wearing hijab. This was four days after they had requested the principal permission to wear hijabs in classes which was not allowed. Till then, students used to wear hijab to the campus and entered the classroom after removing the scarves, the college principal Rudre Gowda had said. “The institution did not have any rule on hijab-wearing as such since no one used to wear it to the classroom in the last 35 years. The students who came with the demand had the backing of outside forces,” Gowda had said.

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Amid the raging row over the Hijab issue in Karnataka, the state government has told the High Court that its order dated February 5 did not ban the headscarf but only delegated the powers to decide the school uniform to the College Development Committees (CDC). The government took a conscious stand not to intervene in the matters related to religious symbols in the educational institutions and hence it delegated the powers to decide the school uniform to the CDCs, comprising the local MLA, Advocate General Prabhuling Navadgi told a full bench of the High Court, led by Chief Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi, on Friday.

"The conscious stand of the state with all responsibility I state that we do not want to intervene in these kind of matters in so far as matter relates to religious symbols issues in the educational institutions," Navadgi told the full bench of the Karnataka High Court during a hearing in connection with the Muslim girsls' plea against the Hijab ban. "But I must say they unnecessarily dragged us into this and made it into an issue when in a plain reading of the February 5, 2022 order, we have not prohibited Hijab. In fact, we have given complete autonomy to the CDC as well as the private college management," the AG argued further. He was referring to the charges of the petitioner Muslim girls who claimed the Government Order (GO) on February 5, restricting students from wearing cloth which can disturb peace, harmony and law and order, was illegal and it was issued without the 'application of mind'. "The attack on the government on this GO saying that this is irrational, gives a communal colour and discriminates against the Muslim women, is absolutely without basis. It does not affect their rights. It is an innocuous order. The government has left it to the institutions on the issue of the uniform," Navadgi argued.

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On the allegation of the petitioners' counsel that there was non-application of mind vis-a-vis the order, Navadgi said the charges that some of the judgments cited in the government order were relevant and some were not, his submission was that sometimes officers record things 'due to over-enthusiasm'. Explaining the reason behind issuing the order prohibiting clothes that could disturb peace and harmony, the AG said the intention was only to ask the students not to wear indecent dress "but it did not say anything more or less than that."

On the charge that the GO was against Hijab, Navadgi said the question of Hijab was not there unless they want him to read something which he was not able to read. "I have read it 10 times--these two paragraphs (of the GO). The question of asking an institution to proscribe or prescribe Hijab -- where does the state come into the picture" the advocate general asked. According to him, the petitioners unnecessarily dragged the state into the issue. He also claimed that ever since the GO was passed on February 5, the state has not received a single complaint about any CDC or a school having prescribed any resolution, which has resulted in an unrest or "our intervention has been invited."

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During the hearing, the AG broadly limited his argument to three points -- Hijab is not an essential religious practice of Islam, preventing its use did not violate Article 25 of the Indian Constitution and the GO, which has been challenged by a few Muslim girls from the Udupi government pre-university college was in accordance with the law. In view of the hijab-versus-saffron scarves row in the educational institutions, the full bench of the High Court comprising Chief Justice Awasthi, Justice J M Khazi and Justice Krishna S Dixit had passed an interim order earlier restraining students from wearing Hijab or saffron scarves on the campus till the final order was passed.