Hijab row has nothing to do with religion, but everything to do with politics

Analysis

 By Shankar Raj*

Bengaluru: The hijab row that is raging across Karnataka has nothing to do with religion, but everything to do with politics. It is a crisis triggered by competitive and turf- protecting politics among aggressive student organisations in campuses, backed by political parties ahead of the 2023 State Assembly elections.

Until the end of last year, wearing hijab was a non-issue. Muslim students were allowed to attend classes wearing the headscarf and even Hindu students had never raised any objections. Then, one day, K Raghupathi Bhat, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator of Udupi and chairman, College Development Committee, Government PU College for Girls in Udupi, read the rule books and decided to stop Muslim girls from wearing hijab to classes.

The decision was not sudden. Of late Campus Front of India (CFI), the student wing of Muslim hardcore Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI), the political wing of the aggressive Popular Front of India, started gaining grounds in coastal Karnataka and Malnad regions which were strongholds of the BJP.

The CFI, backed by aggressive SDPI activists, started asking Muslim students to follow Islamic traditions and it was then that the number of students wearing hijabs started growing. Till a couple of years back, very few Muslim students used to attend classes with hijabs.

This growth of CFI started worrying the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the student wing of BJP, which has been influential in the region for over two decades; and then the battle lines were drawn with saffron shawls storming the campuses. The upsurge of CFI and the backlash by the ABVP led to clashes and communalisation of campuses.

Sources say that a majority of students staging protests for and against wearing hijab to classes are being backed by either the CFI or the ABVP.

The growth of the CFI is directly related to the rising influence of SDPI in those regions as the Congress started losing influence. The Muslims felt abandoned and started gravitating towards the PFI. The SDPI started winning several local body elections with the support of Muslim voters at the cost of the Congress. This got the BJP worried in the communally sensitive coastal region of Karnataka.

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• Karnataka educational institutions closed as clashes erupt over Hijab issue

Now with the hijab issue raging, the Congress, Bajrang Dal, Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Muslim Central Committee of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi have started stoking the hijab fire, hoping to gain some political warmth ahead of the Assembly elections.

But the man who started the hijab ban issue is himself surprised at the violent turn. “We never anticipated it would reach this level. We requested the girls to adjust till the court order. The students are provoked by SDPI and Campus Front of India. This should not have happened. Five [Members of Legislative Assembly] MLAs in Udupi are from the BJP, this issue is not good for us,” said MLA Raghupathi Bhat, chairman, College Development Committee of the Udupi college where the hijab row first erupted.

But he justified his actions in an interview to local media. “We’re just following rules. The college has had a prescribed uniform for several years and students have to remove the hijab when entering classrooms and they’ve been following it strictly till recently. On November 1, we celebrated Mathad Mathad Kannada (speak Kannada) and none of the students wore the hijab. Even in co-ed colleges, students attend classes by removing the hijab”.

On why he took the decision to ban hijabs in the college now, the MLA justified saying “We have proof (photographs) to show that students were not wearing headscarves inside classrooms. We brought out a souvenir in 2008 with pictures of students at several functions and in classrooms. They come wearing hijab inside the compound but enter classes without it. During admission, parents and students signed documents about wearing the uniform compulsorily. These students started their demand on December 30. Four students in II PUC now attended classes last year without hijab. All documents have been produced before the court”.

*Shankar Raj is former Editor of The New Indian Express, Karnataka and Kerala, and writes regularly on current affairs.