In this episode of South Central, hosts Dhanya Rajendran and Anisha Sheth first discuss the hijab controversy in Kerala. It started with a student at St Rita’s Public School in Ernakulam, who was prevented from attending school in a hijab. The hosts are joined by senior journalist Shahina KK and TNM’s Executive Editor Sudipto Mondal.
Dhanya starts the discussion off by pointing out how the school is run by the minority Latin Christian community, and how Karnataka has got into such controversies. In Kerala, the High Court said in a 2018 judgement that children cannot insist on wearing a hijab. The Karnataka HC too said that such a piece of cloth is not essential to practice religion.
Shahina says that we should not connect the question of the essential practice of religion with the hijab. “The question is how society looks at this piece of cloth. It is part of a Muslim girl’s life and practice. So it does not necessarily have much to do with religion, since many women who practice the religion do not wear it. But the issue has become a huge point of debate across the country. I think that there could be a conspiracy behind this. The most important aspect is a child’s education, and nobody can deny that right, no matter the things that may come in the way of it,” she explains.
Shahina adds that the school has not dealt with the issue with empathy. “Kerala has a deep-rooted secular culture, where children of all faiths learn and play together. So when a child is told not to wear a hijab, naturally, she may be taken out of that school and shifted to a school where more children from her community study. This affects the diversity and inter-mingling of children, which the state once prided on,” she says.
Dhanya says that there is a context to what happened in Kerala. This particular place where this school was has had a history of some communal tensions. “It is not true to also stereotype the child’s father by saying he does not care about her education over faith. He told us that his elder children are studying in foreign countries, and he chose this school since it was nearby to their residence. And hijab here is also just a shawl pinned to the child’s hair,” she adds.
“The father also told me that the PTA president of the school is a right-wing Christian, posting publicly in a stereotypically Islamophobic tone,” Dhanya further says.
Sudipto adds that this is unsettling, coming from Christians, who initiated the culture of education and established several institutions across the country. Dhanya says that while in Karnataka, the incident happened in a government college with no uniforms, the Kerala incident happened in a court.
“Imagine a Muslim management school, where a Hindu boy goes to school in black attire during Sabarimala lent. If the management says the boy cannot do that, then what would happen? So answers to different scenarios of non-compliance with uniforms need to be mooted,” says Shahina.
Anisha adds that there is also the reality of the majority religion, and which religion the state is biased towards. “In Karnataka, it was contested before the court on why children wearing other religious symbols like a cross or sacred threads are allowed, while only Muslim girls are targeted,” Dhanya says.
Shahina appreciates the Kerala education minister’s stand. “He said the girl’s education is paramount, with or without hijab,” she adds.
In the second part of the session, the hosts discuss the newly announced Google data centre in Visakhapatnam, whether it is viable for the state, and the row between Karnataka and Andhra ministers over it. The hosts are joined by Indulekha Aravind, a senior journalist who primarily writes on business.
“This spat goes back to last year when the TDP came into power. Karnataka has announced plans to reserve jobs for locals in the private sector. Nara Lokesh immediately said that people are most welcome to move to Andhra for work and investments. Since then, the two ministers have been taking digs at each other’s states. Karnataka is far ahead of Andhra in terms of investments, of course,” Indulekha says.
Anisha says the barbs between Priyank Kharge and Nara Lokesh have been interesting. Dhanya adds that the concessions AP gave to companies for the data centre, especially in the IT sectors, are quite massive. “What Kharge is also saying is that AP cannot afford it,” she says.
Indulekha says that Priyank’s questions are valid. “Chandrababu Naidu himself said that Google has raised concerns about tax cuts and that there should not be future changes in the numbers. PM Modi has assured this. So there should not be a problem, but whether the investments will give adequate returns is not predictable,” she says.
“Water and power generation are the main investments with respect to data centres. Whether this state should be taking on that kind of an investment, especially in the face of water scarcity in Vizag, is a question to address,” Indulekha further says.
Anisha points out that environmentally resource-intensive projects like data centres have been discarded in several first-world countries. “So the question is also whether second-world countries are becoming a dumping ground for such polluting, discarded industries,” she says.
Indulekha says that while industries may get the water, the pressing concern is regarding the residents and other people’s needs.
Tune in to the discussion here.
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Audio Timecodes
00:00:00- Introduction
00:01:04: Diwali Offer
00:01:52 - RSF Press Freedom Nomination
00:05:05 - Headlines
00:19:00 - Kerala Hijab row
00:58:10- Karnataka-Andhra Spat
01:15:27- Recommendations
References
Rowing with the right-wing?: New Atheism in Kerala faces questions over Islam critique
Caught between Islamic laws and Islamophobia: Being an ex-Muslim in Kerala
The plan is Hindu Rashtra, my lords, the hijab is a smokescreen
TNM investigation: How Hindutva group mobilised saffron-clad students at Udupi college
WTF Is: Inside Nikhil Kamath’s networks, narratives and new ambitions
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Produced by Bhuvan Malik, edited by Jaseem Ali, written by Sukanya Shaji.