Ahmadi : The Act does not provide for disallowing hijab, in fact it provides for reasonable accommodation.
Ahmadi : High Court says they have inherent powers, but what power do they have except Rule 11?
J Gupta : Even if wrong section is mentioned, if they have the power, it is a different thing.
Justice Dhulia : See, powers they have.
Justice Gupta : Your argument that it is contrary to statute, it is well understood..
Ahmadi : Under the excercise of powers of the rules, you cannot do something against the Act.
Ahmadi : Also, it says there should be one year advance notice for uniform change.
Justice Gupta : There is no change of uniform.
Ahmadi reads out Rule 11 which says uniform shall not be changed for 5 years and that change of uniform must be prescribed one year in advance.
There is no power given to proscribe the hijab -
Ahmadi : The strand which runs through the Act is to accommodate religious differences. Now, the Rules. Only the Rules speak of uniform.
Refers to Rule 11.
Ahmadi : I am actually saying Act provides for accommodation.
Refers to Section 15 (b), 39(1)(b) and 39(1)(c)-
Ahmadi says GO invokes the Sections of Education Act relating to national intergration and fundamental duties.
Ahmadi now reading the objectives of the Karnataka Education Act. He says his argument is to show the circular is against the Act's objectives.
Ahmadi : Does the state's priority lie with promoting education or with this? Is the Hijab so very intrusive, that you have to ban it?
Ahmadi : If somebody is getting provoked by the hijab, he should have a sense of brotherhood and fraternity.