Panaji: Safina Khan Soudagar, 24, told reporters in Panjim that she preferred her religious belief over the academic and career loss. She had to miss the National Eligibility Test Examination as she was refused to answer the paper with Hijab.
Safina had arrived to appear for NET on December 18 at Panaji, when she was allegedly asked to get off the Hijab. When she refused to do it, the supervisor did not let her answer the exam.
Addressing a press conference on Thursday, Safina narrated the incident when she was stopped from entering the exam hall by a male supervisor.
“ I was scheduled to appear for NET exam on December 18 for the second shift batch. I reached the venue at 1 O’clock and process of checking the IDs began at 1.30 p.m.,” she told a press conference.
“When I reached the official was checking the ID. He looked at my paper, he looked at me and said please remove your head scarf, as with it you will not be allowed inside,” Safina said.
The girl told media persons that she told the male official that she can’t do it as it is against her religious belief.
“I told him that I can’t do it as it is against my religious belief. He began arguing with me and consulted a senior official who was standing next to him (who was a lady),” she said.
Safina said that the male supervisor wanted to see her ears to confirm her identity on the photograph.
“I eventually agreed to show my ears and asked me to direct me to washroom so that I can retie my ‘Hijab’. They refused to show me washroom. Removing Hijab in public was against my Islamic belief because there were lot of men around,” she said.
“They further informed me that I will not be able to answer my exam with Hijab and I will have to sit without it for rest of the exam,” Safina added.
“It was a question about whether I want to answer the exam or I don’t. So I chose to keep my faith above the loss, that was not supposed to have happened (of missing the exam),” she said.
Safina said that while applying for exam, she had gone through the rules on the website and nowhere it was written that there are dress codes. “There was nothing regards to hijab or dress code mentioned. So I don’t think there was anything that they would stop me for my head scarf,” she added.
When contacted, a senior official from Directorate of Higher Education which is providing assistance to UGC to conduct the examination, said that “not only Hijab but even Mangasutra or any other accessories are not allowed in the examination centre to avoid cheating and also from the security point of view.”
“There are stringent guidelines by UGC to ensure that the examination is held in a very transparent manner and the officials were only following it,” he said.
