Karnataka board exams begin amid hijab row

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In the last academic year, of 8,19,398 students enrolled for the class 10 board exams, the number of absentees was 3,769 on the opening day.

Karnataka Secondary Education Examination Board director (exams) Gopalkrishna HN, however, told The Indian Express that this year’s figures cannot be compared with last year’s. “Last year, we had announced that whoever attends the exams will pass and the questions were then set in an objective-type format. But if you compare it to 2019-20 and 2018-2019, the attendance (of examinees) had remained about 98 per cent (in those two years). Then the total enrolment was below 8 lakh while this academic year it has increased from previous years,” he said.

Asked about the reasons for absentees this time, he said they were yet to ascertain how many students remained absent because of the restriction on wearing hijab in classrooms or any other issues.

Vishal R, the Department of Public Instruction commissioner, also told The Indian Express that they are yet to compile data regarding the total number of Muslim examinees who remained absent.

On the eve of the exams, Karnataka education minister B C Nagesh said that following the Karnataka High Court’s order the government has decided that students wearing hijab or any other religious attire will not be allowed inside the exam hall. “They can come to campus wearing hijab but they need to remove it before entering the hall,” he said.

While the exams largely went off smoothly in the state, there were some incidents of students boycotting it over the hijab issue. In Ilkal in Bagalkot district, a female student skipped the exam after she was not allowed to take it after she refused to remove hijab. In another incident, a student was refused entry to a school in Hubballi as she came wearing a hijab and burqa.

A Muslim woman teacher, who was deputed for exam duty in a school in Bengaluru’s Rajajinagar, was relieved from it after she refused to remove hijab, according to block education officer Ramesh.

In Mysuru district’s T Narasipur taluk a student, Anushree, died while writing her exam due to reportedly a cardiac arrest.

In the coastal districts of Udupi and Dakshina Kannada, where the hijab row first erupted, the local education department officials also said the exams passed without any hiccups. The Dakshina Kannada deputy commissioner had issued an order that if the school committees consider hijab as part of uniform, they can allow students to take exams while wearing hijab. As the Muslim leaders had also urged them to appear for exams, the community’s female students attended them, said an officer.

Nagesh, who visited a government high school at Agrahara Dasarahalli in Bengaluru Monday, said, “After two years, a full-fledged examination (descriptive format) is being held and students have turned up in good numbers. We had organised two preparatory examinations for students and it has helped them. There were no incidents of students skipping examinations over hijab, as per my knowledge.”