Melika Karagozlu, a country rights activist, posted a few seconds of video on social media without wearing a hijab. Melika was sentenced to three years and eight months in prison for violating the country’s hijab law.
On July 12, Karagozlu was arrested after participating in a nationwide ‘law disobedience’ program. As part of that programme, she posted a video without hijab on social media protesting the mandatory hijab.
On September 19, Karagozlu’s lawyer Mohammad Ali Kamfirouzi said in a tweet post that the Islamic Revolutionary Court of Tehran announced this sentence recently.
He also wrote that he has several physical complications. The doctor also advised Karagozlu to be under the supervision of a psychiatrist. However, the judge did not take any of these into account while awarding the prison sentence.
Last Tuesday (September 15), 22-year-old Mahsha Amini died in police custody. Different people of Iran are reacting strongly on social media to demand a fair trial for his death. The country’s judiciary has launched an investigation. Meanwhile, Karagozlu has been sentenced to four and a half years in prison.
Hijab has been compulsory for women since the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran. This dress code is strictly enforced by the country’s moral police.
But for the past few years, there has been a strong reaction to the implementation of dress code rules by various people, especially young women, around the various activities of the moral police. In various videos published on social media, policemen often force women into police vehicles.
In 2017, dozens of women took off their hijabs in public to protest. Even then the authorities took strict action against them.
(22 September)