New Delhi: Fifty-eight students, who were suspended for wearing a hijab and staging protest outside their college in Shivamogga district of Karnataka on Friday, were not allowed to enter the institute on Saturday as they refused to shun the headscarf.
“We came here but the principal told us that we have all been suspended and there is no need for us to come to the college. Even the police told us not to come to the college, but we came here. Today, no one spoke to us,” news agency PTI quoted the students as saying.
Despite the government and the Karnataka High Court's interim order restricting the students from wearing hijab or saffron scarves inside classrooms, these girls came to the college at Shiralakoppa in Shivamogga district, and donning the hijab, staged a demonstration against the government pre-university college administration.
The girls were suspended on Friday and were asked not come to the college, a student told PTI. But they came to the college on Saturday again and raised slogans, demanding their right to wear hijab. However, they were not allowed to enter.
The hijab row, that flared up about a fortnight back, shows no signs of abating as protesting girl students continue to come to the educational institutes across the state donning a headscarf.
Students in SJVP College at Harihar in Davangere district were denied entry after they refused to go inside without the scarf, stressing that it was as important as education and that they cannot give up their right.
Similarly, in Vijay Paramedical College in Belagavi district, the students complained that the college administration announced a holiday for an indefinite period due to the hijab issue.
"We will not sit without headscarves. Let the college realise how it affects our education. The principal is not listening to us," a student said, as quoted by PTI.
Sarala Devi College in Ballari district, which has been witnessing protests from the day the hijab controversy erupted, did not allow students wearing the hijab, to enter the institute.
The government college at Gangavathi in Koppal district, too, saw a similar situation where girls were not let in.
Some students staged an agitation in Kudur village in Ramanagara district after which they were not allowed to enter the classrooms.
The ongoing controversy can be traced back to January 1, when six girl students of a college in Udupi, attended a press conference held by Campus Front of India, protesting against the college authorities denying them entry into the classroom for wearing hijab.
This was four days after they had sought permission from the college principal to let then attend classes wearing hijabs, that was not allowed. Till then, they used to wear the headscarf to the campus and removed it before entering the classroom, the college principal Rudre Gowda had said.
According to Gowda, the college had no such rule on hijab-wearing since no one used to wear it to the classroom in the last 35 years. The students who came with the request had the backing of outside forces, the principal said.