By Anmol Irfan
Last month, videos of Muslim students being forced to remove their hijabs in Karnataka, India went viral – causing outrage on social media at the way in which Muslim women were being targeted in India. Many likened the attacks to being next in a long line of attacks on Muslims in the country while some others compared it to the burkini ban in France in 2016. The most popular incident has been that of 19 year old student Muskan, who stood opposed to a mob of Hindutva supporters and shouted Allah-hu-Akbar as they heckled her and other students to remove their hijabs.
The noise made around the ban has led international media outlets like Al Jazeera English and BBC to cover the story as well but even though bigger global outlets like these often take up space in media coverage, it is important to look at the way in which local media approaches such issues. Fatima Qureshi, a Pakistani-Turkish journalist and the Communications Programme Officer for Musawah, described her reaction to Indian media coverage of the incident – and the ban overall – as “Unsurprised but infuriated.”
“The former because of India’s longstanding history of Islamophobia under PM Modi and the far-right BJP party and the treatment of Muslim women. And the latter because a lot of hijabis are viewed as backwards and uneducated by those who view the hijab as a symbol of oppression imposed by Islam,” Qureshi told Media Diversity Institute.
Qureshi is not the only one to call out Islamophobia within India and its othering of Muslim women and girls in particular. In fact, both Pakistani media and social media users were quick to call out the discrimination against Muslim women in India, and hail Muskan as a hero. India’s ban is being compared by many to similar bans in France and Sri Lanka but regional tensions in the region in particular are also escalating the situation in a far more politicized way. Media focus in both India and Pakistan has turned into a nationalist issue of sorts with media outlets more focused on covering how politicians and leadership on either side is responding. When Pakistani leadership summoned Indian Charge d’affaires Suresh Kumar to the Foreign Ministry to condemn the banning of the hijab, India leadership responded by telling their counterparts across the border to “look at your own record.”
The shift in focus within local media – and the need to point fingers and make it another India-Pakistan issue takes away much needed attention from what actually needs to be discussed. The agency and space give to women – particularly women in minority groups – to make their own choices.
“The conversation in my mind became about agency and how is it that we imagine our right to control anyone else’s interaction or choice in life whether that is wearing a hijab or anything else,” women’s rights activist and the Founder of The Maple Advisory Group Aanya Niaz tells Media Diversity Institute.
Speaking about the way in which we are observing responses to such incidents Niaz says,
“Why are we not tackling this with a long term intervention that focuses on and targets mindset shifts. If we are to claim women don’t wear hijab because we are freeing them then firstly I don’t how we think we have the audacity to do that because what gives us the right to assume we know better and secondly if we want to set them free why are we taking away their agency.”
At a time where regional media is doing everything BUT passing the mic, Niaz’s words hit home. It is not just conflicts between the two countries that are distracting from the issue at hand. The islamophobic narratives constantly churned out by state-sponsored and right wing media in India has created such a drastic divide between women’s rights and Muslim women’s rights that the latter group is easily othered without feeling like the former conversation is being affected.
“Right-wing leaning outlets such as Times of India, the Hindustan Times and India Today have published articles and hosted speakers on their shows that spewed anti-Muslim rhetoric very freely, justifying the Karnataka’s courts decision being right,” Qureshi says, adding,
“This is not only a sign but a brazen act of India’s majoritarian politics by the RSS to convert the country into a ‘Hindu rashtra‘. If anything, the self-contradiction of #BetiPadhao (Educate Daughters) and banning a critical sartorial marker for Muslim women only is sewing the seeds of hate and intolerance towards the Muslim minority in India.”
What all of this sensationalised coverage has failed to do is create space for marginalised women to talk about what they want. Whether it be Pakistani media supporting Muskan through the Aurat March’s slogan of #MeraJismMeriMarzi while at the same time calling for that same March to be banned – or Indian media talking about the ban but not actually listening to Muslim women, this idea of control that has become an inherent part of journalism is slowly suffocating the voices of marginalised communities.
Sumaiya Ali, a journalism researcher with BBC shares some of the ways in which this issue can be covered in a more equal and accepting way.
“Indian social media has been flooded with videos of the courageous girl calling Allah-o-Akbar. On Twitter, various spaces sessions were held by groups on the issue. Of Course, a non-biased opinion with original voices including women themselves would help in building better coverage. We need sisterhood to amplify these voices of resistance,” Ali tells Media Diversity Institute.
It is a sad truth that mainstream media outlets are far from fair and political and social agendas always favour the powerful. But until then it is the responsibility of those who have a platform to fight back and more importantly to give up their space when necessary to those whose voices are being silenced.
Photo Credit: PradeepGaurs / Shutterstock
