The Bombay High Court declined to intervene in a decision made by a city-based college to enforce a ban on hijab, burka, and Naqab within its premises.
A division bench consisting of Justices A S Chandurkar and Rajesh Patil expressed their reluctance to intervene in the college’s decision. Subsequently, it dismissed a petition submitted by nine female students who are in their second and third years of a science degree program.
Earlier this month, students approached the High Court to contest a directive from the Chembur Trombay Education Society’s NG Acharya and DK Marathe College that enforced a dress code prohibiting the wearing of hijabs, niqabs, burkas, stoles, caps, and badges on campus.
The petitioners argued that such a directive violated their fundamental rights, including the right to practice their religion, the right to privacy, and the right to make personal choices. The plea termed the college’s action as “arbitrary, unreasonable, bad-in-law and perverse”.
The petitioner’s advocate, Altaf Khan, submitted Quranic verses to the HC to support the claim that wearing a hijab is essential to Islam. He also argued that the petitioners’ rights to choice and privacy were being violated by the college’s decision. The college maintained that the hijab ban was a disciplinary action for a uniform dress code, not against the Muslim community.
Senior counsel Anil Anturkar, representing the college, stated the dress code applied to all students regardless of religion or caste. The girls, however, claimed in their plea that such a directive was “nothing but the colorable exercise of power”.
They initially requested the college management and principal to withdraw the restriction on naqab, burka, and hijab and allow it “as a matter of right of choice, dignity, and privacy in the classroom”.
The girls also raised their grievance against the notice with the chancellor, vice chancellor of Mumbai University, and the University Grants Commission, requesting their intervention “to upkeep the spirit of imparting education to all citizens without discrimination”.
However, when the students did not get any response, they filed a petition in the HC.