PERSECUTION OF WOMEN IN IRAN.. a..la… TALIBAN STYLE?

Printer-friendly versionSend to friendPDF version Prof Dr Colonel (Retired) K Prabhakar Rao The position of women in Iran during the rule of Shah Pehalwi I was more modern along the western lines and every one thought that the country was on Turkish way with Western type governing.   However with rise of Mullahs and unleashing fundamentalist and medieval regime in 1979 driving the nation back to the conceptual days of founding of Islam, hardships have been heaped on the women in Iran in the name of religious values, Shariat and traditions of Islam. Khomeni government seemed intent on making women revolve around rearing true men..  The constitution of Islamic republic made men and women equal before law as far as Shariat allowed.  The most important restrictions were inability to divorce and lack of credibility to women’s testimony in a court of law. One mans testimony was accepted in the trial of a murder while testimony from two women were required to be accepted. Age for consent for marriage was lowered from 15 to 13 years.   Contraception and abortion were also banned. Thus women were not equal in front of law.  Thousands of Iranian women have been cautioned over their poor Islamic dress in recent times and several hundred arrested in the capital Tehran in the fiercest crackdown on what's known as "bad hijab" for more than a decade.  The latest police crackdown on Islamic dress has angered many Iranians - male, female, young and old. But Iranian TV has reported that an opinion poll conducted in Tehran found 86% of people were in favor of the crackdown - a statistic that is surprising given the strength of feeling against this move. Police cars are usually parked outside the shopping malls to catch the erring ladies It is learnt that they are stopping pedestrians and even cars - warning female drivers not to show any hair - and confiscating the motorcars and arresting the women if they argue back. It is very sad that even middle aged women and foreign tourists are not spared and harassed speaking very poorly of the governing in the nation that is at logger heads with Western powers over the nuclear issue Women have been barred from wearing colorful scarves (Headgear) and had to be satisfied with dull and drab colors such as black, grey and dark blue. “If we want to do something we will do it anyway, all this is total nonsense," says a young girl, heavily made up and dressed up. She believes Islamic dress should be something personal - whether you're swathed in a black chador or dressed in what she calls "more normal clothes". Interestingly many women who choose to wear the all enveloping chador agree - saying it's a personal choice and shouldn't be forced on people (1). BBC reported that thousands of women have been cautioned by police over their dress, some have been obliged to sign statements that they will do better in the future, and some face court cases against them. One shopkeeper selling evening dresses reportedly revealed that the moral police had ordered him to saw off the breasts of his mannequins because they were too revealing. Some commentators have suggested that the government is conducting this crackdown to distract attention from the rising cost of living in Iran and increasing tension with the international community over the nuclear issue. And it's not just women who are being targeted this year. Young men are being cautioned for wearing short sleeved shirts or for their hairstyles. Taliban in Afghanistan who were medieval, more fundamentalist, cruel wert to the extent of measuring beards of men with a scale or tape to measure and examine whether they were following Islamic tradition. Offenders were persecuted and flogged. Is Iran going the Taliban way? Probably true. Iranians claim that the Mullahs were severe in the initial days and subsequently there was not much pressure. However of late, the authorities are again after the women persecuting them indiscriminately to implement rigid dress code. Women in Iran supported revolution as a protest against the Shah’s sexy attitude and overtures towards women. Shah of Iran once declared, “ A woman is important in mans life only if she is beautiful and charming… You are equal to a man in the eyes of law.. But excuse me for saying so you are certainly not equal  to a man in capabilities” They expected that democracy under Mullahs would prevail in the country with equality for women and that the society would be saved from the western influences. At the start of the rule of the Iranian revolution, women were central part of the revolutionary activities, they used their influence to rally support for Khomeini through women groups, charity work, and propaganda in the Iranian women’s journals such as Zan –e-Rouz. Sadly it was not to be. To the shock of Iranian women, the mullahs were severe and a new type of Islamic fundamentalist,   cruel and medieval religious dictatorship emerged in Iran under Ayatollah Khomeini. The extent of frustration and its severity among women is evident from the act of self immolation by  Dr Homa Darabi, an Iranian professor at Iranian University and activist of women’s liberation who  put herself aflame by dousing herself in gasoline in protest against the fundamentalist regime and shouted, “death to the Dictatorship and  long live freedom”. Earlier, she could not leave the country as her husband did not sign the consent form. After 28 years of revolution, did Iranian women achieve liberation? Unfortunately no. The freedom of women has been suppressed in the name of religion. The dress code of Islam is pressed up on the women against their will and they are being persecuted and punished by the Iranian moral police (2) sheer by the bull dozer might of the State.. The situation in Iran is different from that of Afghanistan, Iraq or Sudan. There is mass discontentment in these countries. There is resistance, but there is a lack of a mass movement in defense of women’s rights. Such a movement exists in Iran. In Iran, there has never existed a secular state, the separation of religion from the state, or education. The laws have always been religious laws. There has always existed a dictatorship. The efforts to reform the family law in favor of women during the ‘60s were very meager and not very effective. During the 1979 revolution, a women’s rights movement was born. This was not a mass movement, but rather formed by left and intellectual women.   The Islamic Republic attacked women full-force after coming to power. The first phase of the women’s movement was short-lived. It put up a brave resistance but it was silenced after 2 years. Women’s resistance continued in an individualistic fashion, against the veil, gender apartheid and the obligatory dress code. Many women have been imprisoned, tortured, or stoned to death. This brutal oppression was not able to obliterate the spirit of resistance. The new generation reignited this movement on a mass scale and pushed it forward. Fighting against the Islamic veil and apartheid is one of the main battlegrounds. Why then has this massive means of oppression become necessary? Why are all these Special Forces formed to deal with cultural disobedience, non-observance of the veil and gender apartheid? Azar Mazedi asks. “ Are these people a bunch of masochists, who like to practice their culture by being tortured, imprisoned and stoned? What rubbish! Thousands of women who have been executed, stoned and tortured are the symbol of a vast movement against the Islamic laws, gender apartheid and the Islamic veil”. In Iran, there is a special police force to deal with women, those who protest, those who do not observe the veil, and those who are innovative in fashion. This special force was used at the   demonstrations in Tehran. It crushed the demonstration. Despite all the laws against non-observance of the veil and dress code, despite prison sentence, fine and lashing, women in Iran ridicule the veil and in their demonstrations have also burned it. The new generation cannot be silenced, cannot be forced back home. This is the resistance from Iranian women with Great Spirit which no other nation is demonstrating in the world In other Islamic countries, or semi Islamic countries,  women are silently  suffering the persecution and suppression, rather repression, in the name of religion.     It is necessary to draw attention to the statistical figure   of 66% of university entrances that are female. This is in a country in which one need to pass difficult entry exams. There is a very high competition.  One has to take into consideration the state’s efforts to push women home.  This is not a mere statistical.    This is a trend. Every year this figure has risen, from 30% to 66%. The parliament tried to pass laws to reverse this trend, to prevent women from getting in to university in this high number. They argued that this was very detrimental to Islam and the institution of the family. The Mullahs want the women to stick around to the homes and remain items of pleasure and remain as mere cooks. The Islamic parliament becomes alarmed by this statistics. This shows a resilient resistance on the part of a new generation of women in Iran. This brings hope that women’s liberation in Iran is live and kicking. 8 March has become an established tradition in Iran. In the past few years, 8 March has been celebrated in different cities and in different ways.  In 1979, women   organized several 8 March celebrations in Tehran. The society was free from monarchist dictatorship, and the women’s rights activists, were celebrating 8 March for the first time. On the same day, Khomeini ordered women to wear the veil. A large demonstration took to the streets in protest to this reactionary order and demanded women’s equality. This was the birth of a women’s right movement which was silenced after 2 years. The Mullahs were determined to take back the country in reverse gear to remote obscurity where women were denied equality and rights. They were treated as tools for satisfying man lust and as sex toys. A real Taliban inspiration indeed (3). Suppression of women continues with greater vigor in Iran.  The Iranian authorities released seven of the women's rights activists on Wednesday, March 7, 2007 and a further17 on Thursday, March 8. However, Shadi Sadr and Mahbubeh Abbasgholizadeh remain in detention. The authorities are reportedly holding them in solitary confinement, and the women remain on hunger strike.  Security forces attacked and broke up a gathering of hundreds of people marking International Women's Day in Tehran on March 8, 2007. Human rights Watch has demanded that the Iranian government should immediately release the 26 prominent women's rights activists arrested on March 4, and stop its prosecution and persecution of all women's rights advocates. Human Rights Watch is deeply concerned about the health and safety of the detainees, and holds the Iranian government fully responsible for their well-being.  The government has considerably increased its harassment and intimidation of women's rights activists in recent weeks. On the morning of March 4, the Judiciary held a trial for four women's rights activists charged with "acting against national security by participating in an illegal gathering." The government has considerably increased its harassment and intimidation of women's rights activists in recent weeks. "The government of President Ahmadinejad is trying to roll back even the modest freedoms won by Iranian civil society over the last decade," Sarah LeahWhitson, Director of the Middle East and North Africa division at Human Rights Watch.  Said. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch are accusing Iran of increasing persecution and legal prosecution of women's rights activists. As VOA's Stephanie Ho reports, the two groups held a joint news conference in Washington   to mark International Women's Day. Human Rights Watch researcher Hadi Ghaemi says the situation for women in Iran is paradoxical. "Iranian women are at the cutting edge of social activism in Iran," he said. "Although they are visible and extremely successful in every social, economic and cultural domain, Iranian law treats them as second class citizens (4). Zaria a member of L’ association des femmes Iraniennes de montr al states that it is very difficult to protest openly against the regime. The only alternative is to clandestinely undermine the regime and raise the issue outside the country at international forums. Scores of Iranian women  have been jailed, severely punished, and executed for raising their voice against the government of Mullahs, The equality in the face of law is a just eye wash. The real change will occur when they can say, “ I can dress what I want.  I can divorce when I want and have custody of my kids, I can read what I want, I can publish what I write without censoring,  I can work where I want, I can leave when I want”. The Iranian women are waging bold struggle against the repressive fundamentalist mullah inspired regime in Iran. Many are laying down their lives and scores are in jails and repression is going on relentlessly. The situation infact is on similar lines in most of the muslim countries where women are kept under thumb and are discriminated in the name of Islamic law. In many countries women have reconciled to their fate and are helpless. But in Iran their struggle could not be subdued and it is a class struggle by itself. Bibliography 1. Frances Harrison , , Crack down in Iran over dress code, BBC News, Tehran news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6596933.stm 2.Tayana Marshal, Iranian revolution turned against women who supported it. http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:WaRhBP0Is2YJ:www.peak.sfu.ca/the-pea... 3 , Azar Majedi,  Mass resistance is the other side of mass oppression, http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:stEsqVh0_7MJ:www.butterfliesandwheels.com/articleprint.php%3Fnum%3D216+Women+in+Iran+.+Are+they+harassed%3F&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=9 4. .Human right news, Iran releases women right advocates,  Mass arrests signal new level of repression, http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:N6P3kUy54l8J:hrw.org/english/docs/2007/03/07/iran15452.htm+Women+in+Iran+.+Are+they+harassed%3F&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=14 and http://www.hrw.org/photos/2007/iran03/index.html 4Persian Journal .  http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:X2XvyZEonF8J:www.iranian.ws/cgi- bin/iran_news/exec/search.cgi%3Fcat%3D6%26start%3D13%26perpage%3D12%26template%3Dindex/woman.html+Women+in+Iran+.+Are+they+harassed%3F&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=6