Two second-year students of Government Pre-University College for Girls, Udupi who had approached the High Court of Karnataka challenging the hijab ban in educational institutions were not allowed to take final exams wearing hijab on Friday.
The principal told Aliya Assadi and Resham that, as per the government order, they can’t be allowed to appear for the examination with hijab.
On Friday, Aliya and Resham from the commerce stream went to the college and collected their hall tickets in the morning to appear for the Business Studies paper at Vidyodaya Pre-University College in Udupi, which is their examination centre.
They tried to convince the invigilators and principal of Vidyodaya Pre-University College for around 45 minutes but were eventually not allowed any exception to the court order upholding the state government’s hijab ban.
Eventually, the two Muslim students who are the iconic leaders of Muslim girls’ agitation against the hijab ban in Karnataka walked out of the college around 10.45 a.m.
The exam which began on Friday will go on till May 18. The first paper was Business Studies.
While responding to the incident, Karnataka CM Basavaraj Bommai said that he doesn’t know what exactly happened and the state education minister will look into this, ANI reported.
Aliya had last week made a renewed appeal to Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai saying that he still had a chance “to stop our future from getting ruined.”
“You still have a chance to stop our future from getting ruined. You can make a decision to allow us to write exams wearing hijab. Please consider this. We are the future of this country,” she had tweeted.
The Karnataka High Court last month dismissed petitions seeking permission to wear hijab inside the classroom. Upholding the state ban, the court had said that wearing a hijab “is not an essential religious practice of Islam.”
This article first appeared on maktoobmedia.com