Supreme Court on Monday issued notice on a plea seeking a stay on the Karnataka High Court order upholding ban on Hijab in educational institutions. The apex court will hear the case next on Monday (September 5).
Several petitions were filed against Karnataka High Court's order. The HC had dismissed a batch of petitions filed by Muslim girl students studying in pre-university college in Udipi seeking the right to wear hijab in classrooms.
Also read | Supreme Court To Hear Pleas Challenging Karnataka HC's Verdict In Hijab Row
Karnataka High Court in March earlier this year, upheld the hijab ban in educational institutions, stating that wearing hijab is not an essential religious practice in Islam.
Earlier, Karnataka CM Basavaraj Bommai backed the High Court's order and said, "There is no need of raising an issue. Court has already given its judgment. Everyone is following the judgment, 99.99% have followed... whatever decision they take, it has to be followed." He further said that there's no need to raise the hijab issue.
Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai made the comment while the hijab controversy surfaced in Karnataka with a group of students from Mangaluru University staging a protest against some of the Muslim students attending classes with the hijab. The protesting students then accused the principal failed to make the 40 Muslim students remove hijab before entering the campus.
The hijab controversy first flared up in Karnataka in January after some of the students of a government college in Udupi were barred from entering classrooms with hijab.