Muslim Educational Society’s Decision to ban use of face veils hailed

Indian Muslims for Secular Democracy (IMSD) has hailed the decision of Kerala’s Muslim Educational Society (MES) to prohibit girls from wearing “any dress which covers the face” in any of its 150 educational institutions across the state. However, it opposed the MES’ plan of imposing a particular mode of dress as the only acceptable way for Indian women.

Distancing itself from the injunction on even college students to attend classes in “modern dress” (jeans, T-shirts etc), the IMSD statement said, “Such prohibition imposes its own notions of “Indian-ness” and violates women’s right to choose,” IMSD asserted in a press statement. “We do not accept the idea thatIndia only has one particular national dress for women or men. This goes against the very Idea of India. In fact, IMSD is not even opposed to either the hijab or burkha – but just the face veil,” it went on to say.

Describing the face veil as a patriarchal imposition and an affront to women, IMSD said that it supported the ban also in the context of security. IMSD categorically rejects the orthodoxy’s claim that Islam enjoins Muslim women to make themselves “invisible” in the public domain.

Islam, it said, did not prescribe for women to become invisible in public. It merely calls on both men and women to dress modestly.

MES in Kerala controls 10 professional colleges, 18 arts and science colleges, 12 higher secondary and 36 CBSE affiliated schools. It is noteworthy that the MES circular dated April 19 was issued before the decision of the Sri Lankan government banning face covering in all public places following the recent dastardly bomb blasts by Islamist extremists.

In a circular it stated, “MES, which aims at the social and cultural progress of the Muslim community, insists that students, even while maintaining high standards in curricular and extra-curricular activities, do follow a certain decorum in dress code too... Under these circumstances, dresses that are unacceptable to mainstream society – whether they are modern or religious – cannot be promoted”.