India’s top court on Thursday delivered a split judgment on a ban imposed by educational institutions on wearing headscarves inside educational premises in southern Karnataka state.
A two-member bench of the Indian Supreme Court comprising Justice Hemant Gupta and Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia had reserved its decision on the Sept. 22 petitions challenging a verdict by the high court in southern Karnataka state.
Both judges gave two different verdicts on the matter after extensive arguments by the petitioners and the state.
"It's ultimately a matter of choice,” said Justice Dhulia, who sets aside the Karnataka High Court’s judgment. Justice Gupta, however, favored the high court's order and opined the pleas challenging the high court verdict be dismissed.
Ejaz Maqbool, one of the advocates from the petitioners' side, said the operative part of the order says "the matter has to be placed before the Chief Justice of India for the constitution of a larger bench or another bench.”
The issue of the hijab ban started when female Muslim students were barred in January this year from entering their classrooms at a government college in the Udupi district in Karnataka because they were wearing hijabs. Subsequently, the issue spread to other institutions in Karnataka, where Muslim girls were barred from wearing hijabs.
The students approached the Karnataka High Court on March 15 this year, which upheld the ban and ruled that "wearing of hijab by Muslim women doesn't form a part of essential religious practice in the Islamic faith."
The students then approached the Supreme Court, challenging the high court verdict.
Legal experts in India say the case will now go to a larger bench.
"Since the verdict is a split one, the CJI (chief justice of India) will further constitute a larger bench,” M.R. Shamshad, advocate-on-record of the Supreme Court of India, told Anadolu Agency. "The bench will decide which view is correct, or can take its own independent view, in addition to the view taken by the two judges in their separate opinions.”
