Karnataka Election Results 2023: Hijab-ban protest leader Kaneez Fatima wins; BC Nagesh loses Tiptur

NEW DELHI: Kaneez Fatima from Indian National Congress (INC), who had led protests against the Hijab ban in the Karnataka educational institutions, has won from the Gulbarga Uttar constituency in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly elections. She defeated Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Chandrakant B Patil. And former Karnataka education minister, BJP’s BC Nagesh, has lost the Tiptur seat. Nagesh’s most notable decision while in power was the ban on Hijab for Muslim girls in educational institutions across the state.

In February 2022, the Karnataka Government had banned Hijabs in educational institutions. This led to widespread harassment of women students in hijab in schools which continued even a year after the Karnataka hijab ban was imposed. Alongside, there were state-wide protests in Karnataka, with Kaneez Fatima as one of the protest leaders.

In October, 2022, the Supreme Court delivered a split verdict on the Hijab ban. After hearing the matter for 10 days, Justice Hemant Gupta's verdict upheld the Karnataka High Court order to ban Hijab in education institutions. Whereas, Justice Sudhanshshu Dhuli allowed all the appeals and set aside the judgment of the high court.

Karnataka education minister BC Nagesh loses

BC Nagesh has lost his Tiptur seat in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly elections. Nagesh had taken up the post of primary and secondary education minister in 2021.

Nagesh, who received 53,753 votes, lost to Congress candidate K Shadakshari in the Tiptur constituency by over 18,000 votes.

During his tenure, Nagesh had come under criticism when his ministry included a speech by the founder of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) Keshav Baliram Hedgewar in a revised Kannada textbook for students of class 10. The former Karnataka primary and secondary education had defended the decision.

Also on BC Nagesh’s watch, Karnataka framed a set of position papers on education reforms inline with the Nation Education Policy (NEP) 2020 that promoted prejudice against meat-eaters, worshipping tulsi plants and chanting while bathing. Most egregiously, they described the “Pythagoras theorem” as “fake news”.