It seemed to be business as usual on Thursday at Bhandarkars’ Arts & Science College, Kundapura, Karnataka. Students entering the college, rushing to complete neglected assignments, gushing with excitement to share plans for the weekend and some sour that weekend was yet another day away. Unusually though, a small group of girls stood just beyond the gates, taken aback and desperately trying to make sense of what was happening.
They had been stopped and were being denied entry into the college for an assumed violation. The girls were well in time, appeared to be appropriately dressed, in the right uniform, ironed and all, but the staff member who’d stopped them insisted something was amiss; pointing to their hair, covered under a scarf, a right they swore they enjoyed in their democracy and had been doing so for ages now, but he was not having any of it. Take it off or quit college, he demanded. The Principal was called to address the girls who refused to give in and he said the orders came from ‘higher up’ that Muslim students would have to choose between education and religion, the best of both no longer being an option. And from there on mayhem ensued. The students, resolved to not be deprived of their right, showed their college manual where no rule had been violated and said that they had been practising the hijab ever since they had joined college, as had their seniors before them. The management however claimed that the girls were aware that the college prohibited the hijab and that they had started wearing it in order to create controversy.
While the girls remained outside their college without budging, college after college in Karnataka followed suit to shut its doors this February upon young Muslim women who chose to seek education while keeping the colour and style of their hair nobody’s business and like clockwork, the Hindu students, both boys and girls turned up at college, spitting fury, sporting saffron scarves, and chanting Jai Shri Ram, assuring the authorities that this too was a symbol too dear to their faith if the hijab was such an inseparable part of a Muslim woman’s faith. The girls stood there begging, pleading that their studies were being hindered with their exams only two months away, but the authorities stayed put: the hijab would be an unacceptable sight to their eyes.
The entire incident took me back quite vividly to my student days at my alma mater, a reputed women’s college in Bangalore, a certain autonomous, where every now and then our decision to wear the hijab was questioned by the management, who themselves carried off their symbols of Christianity, the habit and crucifix, with such pride and elan. It intrigued them apparently, our choice to cover up and adhere to modest dress codes when we were young and free and our rights constitutionally secure. ‘Do your fathers and brothers force you?’, they would artfully ask, hoping for an affirmative sad story of subjugation and meek obedience, only to walk away dismayed. And this was not so very long ago, only the unforgettable 2014 when our 56-inch chest prince had just been crowned king.
Ours was an inclusive, colourful campus, much like our country itself. So many traditions, a melting pot of cultures, all under the protection of a single, equal constitution. Until now at least. Amidst such a wide range of variety in our country, it amazes me that nobody is ever bothered by a non-Muslim’s choice to display their religion out in the open. Why are there no headlines of colleges and parliament houses banning the entry of respectful Christian nuns in habits, adherent Sikhs in turbans, Buddhist monks in their robes and even supposed holy men and women with chargesheets in saffron garbs of holiness? Why is it only the Muslim citizen who is expected to explain exhaustively to the nation about the choices he has made? We are a country where covering the head has remained a sign of respect across cultures; the Hindu women have done it and some continue to do so, as have the Christians and Sikhs. But has a Christian nun ever been asked under whose coercion did she choose to become a nun? Or has a Sikh been asked who pressurizes him to grow his hair and keep it hidden under a colourful turban? If their choices can be respected as free will then why does a Muslim woman always appear to prying eyes as a helpless, damsel in distress in need of saving, awakening and to be alerted that behind the facades of liberalization, she too can join the race to becoming eye-candies? Why is it assumed that in the 21st century, equipped with knowledge and technology at fingertips, when ceaseless opportunities are the joy of living, only a Muslim woman, would be so out of sync with the evolving world that she would have no idea of how free, determined and strong she is? Wasn’t the infamous Triple Talaq Bill of 2019 all but based on saving the Muslim woman from apparent tragedy? When the few stories of Talaqs gone wrong were brought to the nation’s headlines, with bright screens lit with the sob stories of women sharing podiums with sanghis whose hands they adorned with rakhis and the errand of becoming much needed saviours, some very decisive statistical data was kept cleverly locked away. For instance, if providing security to women in a marriage is really the concern at hand, then 76% of divorced women in India are Hindus, not Muslims. Who then needs to be saved from broken marriages? As far as damsels in distress are concerned, India is home to the largest number of child brides in the world of which 84% are Hindus. Despite the very recent amendments made to the Inheritance Law, only 69% of Hindu women are even aware of any woman who has inherited any land from her parents. If a large population of Hindus can walk the road to nation building armed with archaic laws and troubling practices, then is a Muslim woman’s very enlightened decision of choosing to dress as she wills a matter of such great concern? What is it to anybody what she does with her hair anyway? If half-naked women can adorn our screens and streets proud of their choice (though imposed by arduous societal standards) then so can women whose heads and bodies are draped in black veils of modesty.
The events from Thursday have only brought the question ‘what does the hijab mean to Muslim women?’ to the forefront to be debated in parliament and courtrooms again. Why do Muslim women cover their hair? The answer is the same as what it would be to why do nuns wear the habit and why do the Jews dress modestly. The Muslim woman dresses the way she does to introduce herself to the world as a Muslim woman, even before her name does. She is a woman whose identity does not lie in the dimensions of her body, her waistline, the colour of her lipstick, the length of her skirt, the plunge of her neckline and the style of her hair. She is a woman defined by her character, piety, God-given liberation, dedication, honesty, integrity and all the ideals of a cultured, progressive and sophisticated society. She is not a woman who can be enslaved to your diktats of fashion, romance and modernity. Rather she treads the path enlightened by her knowledge, conscience and morality, taking the bar of feminism higher each day.
Were the incidents from Udupi to happen before 2014, a generation of progressive non-Muslim parents would teach their children to stand with their peers and defend their right to equality, for empathy and humanity alone is the ultimate purpose of a refined education. But what the events saw unfold, quite disgustingly, was our brainwashed Hindu brethren, the apparent majority in parliament and on the streets, who believes their identity is under threat, rile up their youngsters like puppets by the strings and send them to college armed with hatred, misinformation, the venom of vengeance and not to mention, the saffron symbols, to intimidate, terrorize and brandish their unquestioned authority in the land and free reign in parliament. These students when the storm settles down will be expected to walk the same hallways and work together on the same projects.
How comfortable and safe can one really feel to partner with a student who flaunts the same colours as did the man on screen who called for the desecration of graves and the rape of women who share your identity? Though the vile animosity of Hindutva governments was never a secret, what has been tragically disappointing is the actions, or rather the lack thereof, of our brothers in the majority. They who once denied ill feelings of communalism and claimed that the vote was only for development, their silence says otherwise. The vote was indeed less for development and more for the massacre that was promised. The massacre, the mandir, Kashmir, Pakistan and all the age-old election manifestos that we have become suckers for. The promise of an India where inclusivity, to live and let live will become an ideal of the past making way for dominance and repression. Truly, it is the silence of the majority that becomes the prime weapon to establish an efficient dictatorship. History saw Hitler demonstrate it with the Jews and now the world watches in silence once more as Modi replicates it with the Muslims.
The 2012 Nirbhaya rape case brought the entire nation together on the streets demanding justice. Hundreds of social activists led candle marches across the country because Nirbhaya’s right to life had been violated on a dark night in a lonely street and the law had loopholes that protected the culprits. Today, with each minute social media handles are buzzing with videos and posts of what is happening in Karnataka. Young girls, barely 16-17 years of age being harassed on campuses, with journalists, police, college authorities and lawmakers as spectators to the incidents. There is no way in the world that any Indian who owns a smartphone can feign ignorance of this problem that has caught national attention. If the women’s rights activists, engrossed in discussing the few rights enjoyed by the women in Afghanistan, were to look closer home maybe they will see that violation is an understatement to what is happening.
BJP MLA Basangouda Patil Yatnal took to the media to say that the only solution to practising Islam is to migrate to Pakistan which was already given (read charity) to Muslims by Mahatma Gandhi, where they will be free to wear what they will. Though he is right in saying that in Pakistan women really are indeed free to wear what they will, he misquotes history by using the Mahatma’s name to add weight to his hollow words. Pakistan was not an idea of Gandhi. Pakistan is the result of partisan politics implemented by division and fear of extinction by the British, easily lapped up by men like Savarkar, who went on to create parties like the RSS which reenact the same tactics again. The other proposed solution that came from none less than the CM of Karnataka himself was the segregation of classrooms; lowlife, untouchable Muslims in one and the crème-de-la-crème of the Hindus in another. The state Home Minister also felt the need to ‘investigate’ the call records of the girls protesting and those of their families for connections to ‘terror outfits’. While India has for centuries been witness to Brahminical hegemony, today it pays testimony to the rot that festers even in the highest echelons of our governance.
Dodging the many taunts of moving to Pakistan most Indian Muslims swallow emotions but do not say why those words hurt so much. When Pakistan as an idea was proposed, so was the fear that in India there will be a time when Muslims will have to prove their patriotism ten times more than those practising any other religion; that the Hindus being a majority will treat Muslims as second-class citizens, deprived of rights and respect; that India will soon have no place for madrassahs, mosques, hijabs, azaans, namaz, Eid and eventually Muslims itself. Many who accepted the foretelling fled to establish a land where they reigned and rejoiced. But a lot many, like our forefathers refused to buy the fear mongering and stood by the India they knew and fought for, reassuring their families that no such time would come where the equality, brotherhood and spirit of this land would be questioned. THIS was the land they chose to remain in and call home even when given the choice to abscond; having a Hindu neighbour, was what they chose over a Muslim neighbourhood that would have surely protected them, only to watch Hindus today accusing them of anti-national feelings and offering them one-way tickets to a country with which they have just as many grievances as they do, maybe even more. The prophecy it seems wasn’t so wrong after all.
We stand today at a crossroads where one only has to look at our UAPA convictions to know that in India, being a Muslim is the highest treason you could commit. The fire of segregation that was limited to only the hoi polloi and the bourgeoisie of our society has caught up with the likes of even Shah Rukh Khan, whose well-intended prayers for a deceased have to be explained and defended to those fanning its flames. During the CAA protests in 2020, it was famously being said that this is a fire that will engulf every house if not put out. An optimist would say, there is still time, it can still be made to go away. But a realist only has to look outside the comforts of his home to see that the veranda that adjoins his, is already up in flames. Time is all we don’t have.
