The Sri Lankan government issued a decree to ban ¡®burqas¡¯ and other face coverings in public. The ban effective from Monday (April 29, 2019), comes after the attacks on Easter Sunday that killed over 300 people and injured 500.
President Maithripala Sirisena said he was using an emergency law to impose the restriction. A series of blasts ripped through eight locations of the island country. The attacks were carried out by the Islamic State. In response, the Sri Lankan government banned burqas.
While many muslim leaders criticised the move, author Taslima Nasreen took to Twitter to show her support for the decision. Nasreen is a Bangladeshi-Swedish writer who has been living in exile since 1994. She termed burqa as a ¡®mobile prison¡¯.
Nasreen has always been vocal about women¡¯s rights and women empowerment movement in Bangladesh and has also characterised Islam as a ¡®misogynistic¡¯ religion. She has even faced backlash from Islamic right-wingers in Bangladesh.
In an earlier interview, Nasreen had mentioned her stance on burqas in general, "If you're truly secular, encourage Muslim women not to wear burqa and introduce a universal civil code."
But people on social media were divided on her opinion.?
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While this debate is not new, Nasreen's comment certainly seems to have added fuel to the fire.