Hijab row: Karnataka order on uniform ‘religion neutral’, says govt; blames PFI for trouble

New Delhi: The Karnataka government order that kicked up a row over hijab was “religion neutral”, the state government told the Supreme Court on Tuesday, launching a strong defence of the state and blaming the PFI for the controversy it claimed was part of a “larger conspiracy”.
Insisting that the agitation in support of wearing hijab in educational institutions was not a “spontaneous act” by a few individuals, it said the state government would have been “guilty of dereliction of constitutional duty” if it had not acted the way it did.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for Karnataka, told the court the Popular Front of India (PFI) started a campaign on social media which was designed to create an agitation based on “religious feelings of the people”.
The PFI is widely viewed as a hardline Muslim organisation and has been blamed for several incidents of communal violence, provoking calls for imposing a nation-wide ban on it. The organisation itself has rejected the allegations.
Mehta told a bench of Justices Hemant Gupta and Sudhanshu Dhulia the PFI started the social media campaign over the Islamic headscarf earlier this year and there were continuous social media messages asking students to “start wearing hijab”.
“In 2022, a movement started on the social media by an organisation called the Popular Front of India and the movement, as an FIR which was lodged subsequently suggested and now culminated into a charge sheet, was designed to create a kind of an agitation based on religious feelings of the people and as a part there were continuous social media messages that start wearing Hijab,” Mehta said.