{"id":174804,"date":"2022-03-17T20:17:44","date_gmt":"2022-03-17T14:47:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=174804"},"modified":"2022-03-17T20:17:44","modified_gmt":"2022-03-17T14:47:44","slug":"treating-values-of-individual-freedom-as-trifles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/treating-values-of-individual-freedom-as-trifles\/","title":{"rendered":"Treating values of individual freedom as trifles"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

News<\/strong>: Recently, The Karnataka high Court has given its judgment in the hijab controversy case (or the<\/span> Resham v\/s State of Karnataka Case (2022)<\/span><\/b>, wherein a <\/span>ban imposed on the use of hijabs by students in classrooms across the State (Karnataka) was upheld.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What has the High Court said in its judgement?<\/span><\/b><\/h5>\n

The High Court’s judgement is based on the following three conclusions:<\/p>\n

–<\/strong> The wearing of a hijab is not an essential practice<\/strong> of the Islam. Therefore, the right to freedom of religion is not impinged; <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

–<\/strong> No substantive right to free expression and privacy can be claimed within the confines of a classroom. T<\/span>he court classifies <\/span>the classroom <\/span>as \u201cqualified public space<\/span><\/b>\u201d, where individual rights cannot be asserted to \u201cthe detriment\u201d of \u201cgeneral discipline and decorum\u201d. \u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

–<\/strong> The government\u2019s order does not by itself ban the use of a hijab, it is neutral, and therefore, there is no discrimination aimed at Muslim women students.\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The judgment holds that any accommodation in the uniforms defeat the very purpose of uniforms.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Court ruled that the individual\u2019s rights could be abridged in the interests of public order, morality or health.\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What are the issues with the judgement?<\/span><\/b><\/h5>\n

Ideals of the Constitution of India<\/span><\/b>: As per<\/span> The Preamble<\/span>, the state has to secure to all citizens, <\/span>liberty<\/span>, <\/span>equality and fraterni<\/span>ty which were called as <\/span>\u201ca union of trinity<\/span><\/b>\u201d by Dr. BR Ambedkar. Divorce one from the other defeats the very purpose of democracy.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Enforcing popular morality: <\/span><\/b>In<\/span>\u202f<\/span>Resham vs State of Karnataka Case (2022<\/span><\/i>), the Karnataka High Court (HC) has enforced the popular morality of the day. It has given a blow to the B.R. Ambedkar\u2019s union of trinity.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Court’s use of Precedent: <\/span><\/b>The court referred to only those \u201cessential religious practices\u201d which are enjoying constitutional protection. These did not cover wearing of a hijab as a legitimate exercise of religious freedom. Similarly, the SC did the same Tandav Dance \/<\/span> Ananda Margis faith related case in 2004.\u202f<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Free choice and state action: <\/span><\/b>In this case individual freedom was not at odds with group rights. Here, the exercise of <\/span>free choic<\/span><\/b>e<\/strong> has been curtailed by state action.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In this case, the wearing of the hijab was pleaded to be a matter of <\/span>\u201cfreedom of conscience\u201d<\/span><\/b> guaranteed in <\/span>Article 25 of the Constitution<\/span><\/b>. Unlike this case, In the\u202f<\/span>Bijoe Emmanuel<\/span><\/b>\u202fCase (1986), SC protected the freedom of conscience i.e., right of a student of not singing of the national anthem.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In\u202f<\/span>the present case, the onus to prove<\/strong> that the petitioners conscientiously believed in the necessity of the hijab was put on the students.<\/strong> However, the onus should have been on the state to establish that students were not wearing the hijab out of a sense of conscience.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

C<\/span>hoosing to wear the hijab is merely exercising a form of identity relatable to the rights to freedom of speech and privacy.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Ignoring the test of proportionality<\/strong>: Court ignored determining when and how the right to free expression can be legitimately limited<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What is the way forward?<\/span><\/b><\/h5>\n

There could have been \u201creasonable accommo<\/span><\/b>dation<\/strong> in this case. For example,<\/span> Kendriya Vidyalayas(KVs), allow for hijabs within the contours of the prescribed uniforms i.e., even within the existing dress code, many accommodations can be made.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Judiciary should act as a \u201c<\/span>sentinels on the\u202f<\/span><\/b>qui vive<\/span><\/i><\/b>\u201d. It should prevent any effort to undermine social democracy.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/span><\/b>: The post is based on an article \u201c<\/span>Treating values of individual freedom as trifles<\/span><\/b>\u201d published in The Hindu<\/strong> on 17<\/strong><\/span>th<\/strong> Mar 22<\/strong>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

News: Recently, The Karnataka high Court has given its judgment in the hijab controversy case (or the Resham v\/s State of Karnataka Case (2022), wherein a ban imposed on the use of hijabs by students in classrooms across the State (Karnataka) was upheld.\u00a0 What has the High Court said in its judgement? The High Court’s… Continue reading Treating values of individual freedom as trifles<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10328,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1230,9],"tags":[212,10498],"class_list":["post-174804","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-pm-daily-articles","category-public","tag-gs-paper-2","tag-the-hindu","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10328"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=174804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174804\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}