With the passage of a new law by the parliament to impose tight clothing standards, women in Iran will now be subject to a Rs 49 lakh fine for disobeying the nations hijab mandate. According to lawmaker Hojjat ol-Eslam Hossein Jalali, further penalties for failing to wear a hijab include having ones passport revoked and being prohibited from using the internet. Women who are caught breaking the hijab requirement in public places such restaurants, offices of government, schools, and colleges will be subject to sanctions.The protests triggered after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini who was allegedly not wearing the headscarf properly in Iran. After which, a number of women have given up their hijab to defy the rules set by the Islamic Republic.According to Jalali, the rule was finalized after numerous meetings with the Supreme Council of Cultural Revolution and the National Security Council. In December, amid nationwide protests, Jalali had said that thirty-seven different government organizations that were responsible for implementation of the existing hijab law had all received the relevant instructions to enforce it.Lack of Hijab will be like new CovidInfuriating rights activists, an Iranian cleric compared COVID to refusing to wear the hijab. Mohsen Araki, Member of the Assembly of Experts, said that the Islamic Republic “will not allow improper hijab to spread in the Islamic society” and that it is a “new COVID” trying to ruin the society. “The goal of the enemies is to destroy the independence of Iranian women because a woman without hijab will not be independent and free and will be a person who is bound by others lust,” he added.Hijab enforced to avoid women coming out without clothesAn Iranian cleric requested last month that all women wear the hijab before going out without clothes in the summer. According to Mohammad Nabi Mousavifard, the government must continue to enforce the hijab law. He said, “We have to pay for the preservation of religious values, even if we need to go to court several times.”“People and social service providers should stop delivering services to individuals without hijab People should give ladies with inappropriate hijab warnings and not be indifferent, else they would come to the street nude in the summer,” he added.The list of such strange statements is long over the hijab row.Less rain results of women without hijab: ImamAn Iranian imam blamed women who dont wear hijab for the lack of rainfall in the country which has in turn triggered a water crisis. According to Mohammed-Mehdi Hosseini Hamedani, a close aide of Irans supreme leader Ali Khamenei, women in the Islamic Republic have “caused a lack of precipitation across the country” by disobeying the requirement to wear a hijab. The imam also highlighted that all individuals who dont wear a headscarf must be faced by the state.“It is not possible to imagine that we are living in an Islamic country when we enter some institutions, shopping malls, pharmacies, etc.!” he said while suggesting that authorities should warn shops and malls to deter the women who defy the mandatory rules of hijab.
