New Delhi: The hijab row in Karnataka continued to be in focus in Urdu press this week, with several foreign nations wading into the controversy even as a definitive court verdict is awaited in the case.
Meanwhile, election fever too has intensified in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur, with Uttar Pradesh being the focus of attention with statements and counterstatements being made by political rivals. Urdu newspapers balanced their reportage of developments in the hijab controversy, with their coverage of election news.
ThePrint brings you a wrap of the Page 1 headlines and editorials from Urdu newspapers this week.
The ‘tragedy’ of hijab row
On 13 February, Roznama Rashtriya Sahara carried on its front page a statement from the Ministry of External Affairs that said India would not tolerate any interference in its internal issues. The reference was to the criticism made by several countries over the ongoing Hijab controversy in Karnataka. On 12 February, Inquilab wrote in its page one lead story that Sikh organisations too had decided to protest against the hijab ban.
On 15 February, Siasat reported on the front page that the Karnataka High Court has ruled that students wearing the hijab would not get entry into schools. On the same day Inquilab reported how what began as a matter of whether students could wear the hijab or not had now become a broader issue, with teachers also being asked to remove the garment.
A day later the lead story in Roznama stated that while the tension over hijab continues, several students sporting the garment had chosen to walk out of examinations, rather than taking it off.
In an editorial published on 14 February, Roznama wrote that the hijab issue is one of politics and that is why a non-issue has been made into an issue, forcing closure of educational institutions, and jeopardising the future of students. The paper called it a tragedy.
In another editorial on 15 February, the paper wrote that earlier when news would come in from France and other European nations about objections being raised against the wearing of hijab there, it used to be a surprise that something as innocuous can become a bone of contention, but now that same situation has arisen in Karnataka. The paper also wrote that the matter at stake for the students in Karnataka and their families is not just their religious belief. They, like many others in the country, are choosing to make this an issue of their rights, which is why they have chosen senior advocate Devdutt Kamat to fight their case.
Also read: Now, a Karnataka lecturer resigns after being asked to remove hijab by college
Assembly elections
As the fight in assembly elections in five states gets closer to the finish, and the rhetoric more and more vitriolic, political developments here continued to jostle for space on the front page of Urdu newspapers.
On 13 February, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s diatribe against the opposition in Lucknow, where he accused them of being immersed in dynastic politics and corruption, made it to the front page of Inquilab.
On 18 February though, it was his predecessor Manmohan Singh’s rare political intervention that made the headlines. Singh’s critique of the Modi government was on the front page of Roznama. The newspaper on 15 February had carried an interview of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on the front page, where he had said that during the SP-BSP rule in the state it seemed as if a curfew had been imposed in the state. He also described the entire population of the state as his family, while claiming that for the opposition it was only the 25 members of their family who are taken care of.
On its front page on 15 February, Roznama gave equal space to Arvind Kejriwal, Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi under a banner headline “In Punjab, BJP, Congress and AAP have started flexing their muscles”.
The second phase of polling in Uttar Pradesh on 14 February and the single-phase polling in Uttarakhand was also covered on the front pages. Inquilab on the same day carried on its front page Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi’s statement that she could lay down her life for her brother Rahul. The same speech was in Siasat under the headline that the Prime Minister should stop misleading people on what happened in the past 70 years and start talking about “real issues”.
In its 18 February editorial, Inquilab wrote that BJP’s “polarisation tactics, where the party talks about Jinnah to hijab and triple talaq to exodus”, have failed to mobilise voters in Uttar Pradesh, where people are angry with the party. The old plank of vikas has lost traction on the ground because in the past five years no such noteworthy development work was done in the state.
In an editorial on 13 February that was not directly linked to the elections, but would have an indirect effect on it, Siasat wrote that the Supreme Court’s rap to the Adityanath government for seizing properties of protesters against the Citizenship Amendment Bill should make the government rethink its governance model.
News from across the world
The tension at the Russia-Ukraine border, which has caused global concern, was on the front pages of Urdu newspapers too.
Siasat on 17 February reported that India had set up a control room in Kiev for its own citizens. On 15 February, Inquilab reported about the ban by the government of India on more Chinese apps. In its editorial on the same day the paper wrote that one thing was certain that China is not a country to be trusted and doing so amounts to fooling oneself. It also wrote that the boycott of the Beijing Olympics was “too little too late” given that China has chosen to completely ignore the fact that its choice of a Galwan “hero” as the torchbearer had upset Delhi.
‘Disco King’ no more
On 17 February both Roznama and Siasat carried on their front pages articles saying that while the Hindi film industry was yet to recover from the loss of Lata Mangeshkar, shocking news had arrived of musician Bappi Lahiri’s demise. Siasat described him as a “disco music champion”, while Roznama used the title by which he is popularly known, “Disco King”.
Also read: ‘States did it first’: Modi justifies 2020 Covid lockdown, denies govt agencies misused for polls