Muslim women in southern India are seeking to overturn a state policy that allows schools to ban the hijab in a case that has polarized the country.
Modi says his policies benefit all Indians. But his party faces several key state elections this year, and political observers say the hijab debate could fire up his base.
Students and their families objected, but officials in the BJP-run Karnataka replied Feb. 5 that students must follow the dress codes set by their schools and that a ban on hijabs did not violate their constitutional rights. An interim court order bars students in the state from wearing any religious garments in classrooms until the headscarf issue is resolved.
“I condemn the government’s decision to disallow us from entering with a hijab before the hearing is finalized,” she told NBC News. “They cannot force this upon us. We feel uncomfortable and disrespected.” “School is not the place where you have to insist on your priorities or your choices with regard to your faith,” Ganesh Karnik, a BJP member of the Karnataka state legislature, said in an interview. “A school is a place where children from different communities, different faiths come together.”