A private college in Karnataka’s Udupi district on Friday stopped students wearing hijabs or headscarves from entering the campus, NDTV reported.
This came a day after a government pre-university college in the same district barred students wearing hijabs from attending classes.
On Friday, about 40 students protested outside the gates of the Bhandarkar’s Arts and Science Degree College in the Kundapur town after being denied entry unless they took off their headscarves.
About 40 Muslim male students also sat outside the college to express solidarity with their female classmates.
The protestors cited a guideline that said that students are allowed to wear a headscarf as long as its colour matches with the dupatta, The News Minute reported.
On Thursday, a video shared widely on social media showed students of the Government Pre-University College in Kundapur pleading with the principal to allow them to attend classes while wearing hijabs.
The students were seen telling the principal that the examinations are merely two months away, and questioning why they are being barred for this reason now.
This was a day after about 100 boys affiliated with a Hindutva outfit came to the college wearing saffron shawls to protest against Muslim girls wearing hijabs inside classrooms.
For nearly a month, students at the Government Women’s Pre-University College in Udupi also protested after the college did not allow them to attend classes while wearing hijabs.
On Tuesday, Resham Farooq, a student at the college, filed a petition in the Karnataka High Court demanding that they be allowed to wear hijabs.
On Monday, Udupi MLA K Raghupati Bhat said that students need not attend class if they wear the headscarves.
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