by ANGSHUMAN CHOUDHURY & SURAJ GOGOI
Beneath the seemingly secular pushback against the hijab lies a sinister single-point agenda of erasing the Muslim way of life from public space.
First and foremost, we would like to clearly state that the right to wear the hijab (or not) should rest with Muslim women. That choice should solely be their prerogative. This should be the beginning and end of any intellectual discussion on the use of the veil in schools, colleges or any other public space.
The current campaign against Muslim college-going students wearing the hijab first began last month at a single college located in the coastal Karnataka district of Udupi. Then, another college in Kundapur in the same district stopped a group of veiled students from entering its premises. The pushback, laced with physical intimidation and sectarian sloganeering, is now gradually snowballing into a larger movement against the donning of hijab in educational institutions.
What was a non-issue (or in some places, nothing more than a subterranean issue) till just a few weeks prior, has now become a national emergency. The matter has reached the Karnataka High Court, which has now ordered students to refrain from wearing the hijab (alongside other religious articles of clothing) in classrooms.
It is crucial to understand how the Hindutva forces are framing this offensive against the hijab. When we do that, we might also begin to make sense of why so many liberals, instead of pushing back against the right-wing tirade, are partaking in this show of majoritarian might. The whole issue then becomes a prism into the overwhelming cultural majoritarianism of Narendra Modi’s India that is strengthening the roots of anti-minority thought with great success.
Hindutva turns secular
There is a certain duality in how the Hindutva ecosystem is pushing the anti-hijab discourse into the mainstream. On the streets of Karnataka, the pushback, led mostly by young Hindu students, is awash with overtly sectarian hues. The provocateurs have come out wearing saffron stoles and are chanting “Jai Shree Ram.” There are visuals of one mob hoisting the saffron flag on a pole meant for the tricolour in a college in Shimoga.
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