The party reportedly shared on social media the personal details of students, who filed petitions against the hijab restrictions in educational institutions, presently being heard by the High Court. It drew sharp backlash as the petitioners are minors
The Karnataka unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday allegedly shared the identity and other details of the girls from Udupi who have approached Karnataka High Court against the ban on hijab in classrooms, to allege that the opposition Congress was using minors to stay relevant in politics.
Apparently after coming under criticism, the party deleted its tweets in English as well as Kannada.
The party had tweeted, “Five of the students involved in #HijabRow are minors. Don’t CONgress leaders Sonia, Rahul & Priyanka have any guilt for using minor girls to stay relevant in politics? How low will they stoop to win elections? Is this what “Ladki hoo lad sakti hoon” means, @priyankagandhi?”
Along with the tweet, the party put out the personal details of the girls from Udupi, who had filed petitions in the High Court.
Taking a strong view against BJP’s Karnataka unit, Shiv Sena MP Priyanka Chaturvedi tweeted, “Shameless @BJP4Karnataka tweets the addresses of the minor girls in order to attack the opposition. Do you’ll realise how insensitive, sick and pathetic this is? I request @DgpKarnataka and @TwitterIndia to take action and take down the tweet. Also seek @GoI_MeitY intervention.”
The Rajya Sabha member also demanded that the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights take this up immediately. “This is a criminal act to share names and addresses of minors. This is unacceptable,” Chaturvedi further tweeted.
Karnataka is witnessing a row over Hijab versus Saffron scarves, which started since December end in Udupi in coastal Karnataka.
On January 1, six girl students of a college in Udupi attended a press conference held by Campus Front of India (CFI) in the coastal town protesting against the college authorities denying them entry into the classroom by wearing Hijab.
The full bench of the Karnataka High Court where the girls had petitioned is hearing the matter on day-to-day basis.
The Court, in its interim order pending consideration of all petitions related to the hijab row, last week restrained all the students from wearing saffron shawls, scarves, hijab and any religious flag within the classroom.