India hijab ruling: Courtroom upholds ban in Karnataka state that prompted non secular clashes

The controversy erupted after college students staged a small protest in January demanding they be allowed contained in the classroom whereas carrying the Islamic clothes.

The dispute was seen as a logo of deepening non secular tensions within the state, the place authorities ordered the closure of all excessive colleges and faculties for a number of days to discourage protests in early February. Rallies within the state’s capital, Bengaluru, have been additionally banned exterior academic establishments for 2 weeks.

Scores of ladies from different Indian cities, together with capital Delhi, Hyderabad and Kolkata, additionally took to the streets in assist of the Muslim women.

State authorities had supported the hijab ban, citing the state’s mandate on non secular apparel.

However consultants and activists say the hijab row runs deeper than a costume code, claiming it is indicative of a wider crackdown on India’s minority Muslim inhabitants since Modi’s BJP got here to energy nearly eight years in the past.

Karnataka — the place simply 13% of the inhabitants is Muslim — is ruled by the BJP, and the state has already handed laws critics say favors Hindus.

Lawyer Mohammed Tahir, who represented one group of petitioners in courtroom, instructed CNN final month that Karnataka was a “hotbed” of Hindutva ideology, supported by many right-wing teams, which seeks to make India the land of the Hindus.

“We welcome the decision. Nevertheless, we’re but to establish the reasoning,” one of many women’ attorneys, Shatabish Shivanna, instructed CNN of Tuesday’s judgment. “We are going to discuss to the petitioners after which we’ll look out to what authorized recourse we need to take.”