HIDE AND SEEK?

 

 

Britain is a queer nation, turning queerer during Tony Blair’s regime. The moment it extricates itself from one trouble; it becomes impatient to get into a fresh one. The trait resurfaced last week after an announcement regarding the veil worn by Muslims created widespread furore in Britain. While Britain was still struggling to come to terms with the results of northern Ireland elections, the government’s plans to allow schools to ban the veil, came as a rude shock to the 1.8 million strong Muslim community in the UK. Britain’s Department for Education and Skills (DFES) has granted its schools the right “to decide what pupils should and should not be allowed to wear in class.” This decision will also clear the way for the schools to “outlaw wearing of badges, insignia or other features linked to gang membership.”

Although no particular dress has been mentioned, the decision is widely perceived as a move to ban veils put on by Muslims students at home as well as in schools. It was also made clear that only the naqab (the face-covering veil) and not hizab, (scarf and headgear) can be outlawed. Massoud Shadjareh, the chairman of Islamic Human Right Commission, while talking to TSI from London said, “Individual Britons should be allowed to decide what they wish to wear, whether a veil, turban or baseball cap. The whole thing has becomes an issue that goes far beyond the veil. When 99.9% of the Muslim community in Europe does not wear the veil, how does it become an issue of integration?”

His views are echoed by average British Muslims too. They perceive it as a move to segregate Muslims from the mainstream. The mistrust between Muslims and the administration is so deep-rooted that every initiative by the government is seen as a part of a larger conspiracy, the conspiracy to isolate them from national mainstream. It is partly true in a sense that Muslim girls will start flocking to schools where these directives are not implemented and thus it might lead to the formation of ghettos among the institutions and eventually prove a major roadblock in the Islam-West integration plan.