BENGALURU: The Karnataka government has provided ‘Y’ category security to the judges, including the chief justice, who passed the verdict on the hijab row. The decision was taken amid the recent statements made in Madurai threatening to kill the judges, following which an FIR was registered in Bangalore.

The historical judgement on hijab row was passed on March 16 by a bench comprising of Chief Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi, Justice Krishna S Dixit and Justice J M Khazi, dismissing the petitions filed by the students of P U College in Udupi, seeking permission to wear hijab in the class. The court had held that wearing hijab is not part of the essential religious practices in Islamic faith and upheld the government’s order banning all religious clothing in educational institutions. It also ruled that the prescription of a school uniform is a reasonable restriction and that the Karnataka government’s order was not in violation of rights. The students do not have any right to oppose it. The court had pointed out that mandating uniforms in schools was not a violation of constitutionally guaranteed freedom of expression or privacy. The court also rejected the students' demand for an interim order allowing hijab during Ramadan.

Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai had called the opposition ‘fake secular’ as they did not condemn the Madurai incident. “Why are the "fake secular" lobby silent even after 3-4 days of the incident? People threaten to kill judges because of the verdict and they talk about how judges will meet with accident. Even after this, why are you all silent, just to appease the section? That is not secularism, it is communalism. I condemn this and you all should break your silence and we should be united”, he said. The chief minister has asked the state DGP to coordinate with Tamil Nadu for taking the accused into custody. Lately, three Thowheed Jamath functionaries from Tamil Nadu were nabbed for making derogatory statements against the Karnataka high court and its judges in a public meeting in Koripalayam, Madurai.