Mandya, 12 Feb

Last Wednesday, a 19-year-old girl left home for college situated around 5 kms away from her house. She was running late and wanted to reach her college in time to attend a class on Company Law, a subject on which she had to submit an assignment.

As she reached her college gate, she found a group of boys hanging around, saffron stoles around their necks. They stopped the hijab-clad girl and asked her to remove the hijab and enter the college. An argument ensued, but before things got out of hand, the watchman stopped the boys and allowed the girl into the college. As she rode her bike into the college, parked it and started walking towards her class, she saw another group of boys, who began swirling their stoles in the air shouting Jai Shree Ram. "I was angry and upset. All I was thinking of was reaching my class on time. When they started walking towards me, jeering me, I stood there and screamed the only retort I could think of," the girl told Salar News in her first face-to-face conversation with a City-based newspaper.

By this time, the college principal and a couple of teachers had arrived and the girl was escorted to her class. "My classmates were there and I sat down with them as usual and attended the lecture which lasted for a full hour." By the time the lecture on Company Law was over and the Second Year BCom student came out of her class, the video that somebody had captured of the entire exchange had gone viral, Allah hu Akbar had become a global slogan, and 19-year-old Muskan Khan, an unlikely celebrity.

Salar News caught up with the young girl in her house on Saturday morning to get a bird's eye view of the entire incident and ask her about what exactly took place on that fateful day.

Clad in a hijab, Muskan begins the conversation by saying that she had no idea that there was so much discussion happening around the topic of hijab before the incident. “I left for college wearing my hijab, just like I have always done. I had no idea what was going on. It was only when I reached college and saw all those boys at the gate, that I realised that something was amiss. They shouted at me and I shouted back and went to my class. I had no idea that this would become such a big issue and the videos would go viral.”

The video of the girl shouting Allah Hu Akbar at a mob of young men wearing saffron shawls has captured so much attention of not only the Indian media, but media across the world that the phones of her middle-class family members have not stopped ringing. Politicians and other prominent personalities are making a bee-line for the house, situated in a quiet residential area of Mandya, a small city about 100 km from Bengaluru. Many have even promised cash awards for the ‘brave’ girl.

The second child of a local businessman Mohammed Hussaid, Muskan, however, seems unperturbed by all this. She just wants to go back to college when it reopens next week, and hopes that the frenzy would have died down by then. “I am not connected to any political party. I have no political ambitions. I just did what I did on the spur of the moment,” she maintains.

Muskan says that her Hindu and Christian friends and classmates fully support her. Many of them -- both boys and girls -- are firmly standing by her side because they say, “I was fighting those boys alone.”  This, along with the fact that none of the boys in the crowd swirling the saffron stoles were from her class, has made her a hero among her friends. “A lot of those boys were not even from my college. There were a lot of outsiders in the crowd,” she says.

This is also the reason Muskan doesn’t want to complain against them. “They seemed to be provoked and misguided,” she says, displaying wisdom far beyond her age. “They have been told to do this. Inshallah, tomorrow, they will think about what they have done. Akhir who bhi mere bhai hain (after all they are my brothers too),” she adds.

Is she aware of the parallels being drawn with the Nobel Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, with regards to how she is being prevented from going to college? No, says Muskan. “I am not aware of that. I just did what I thought was right at that time. If someone is comparing me to someone so important, I am thankful.”

Muskan is rather indifferent of the court’s interim ruling that religious dresses cannot be allowed in educational institutions. “I am hopeful,” she says. “I trust the Constitution of India. I know that it is not against any religion, and I will not be deprived of my right to wear my Hijab.” She is also clear about wanting to continue her education in the same college. “I still have one more year of under graduation left and I want to continue studying in the same institution,” she says, after which she would like to pursue an LLB and become a lawyer. She, however, adds that she would like to be allowed to complete her studies in peace. “I want my future protected,” she reiterates.

The 19-year-old is cognizant of the fact that this entire controversy could backfire in the form of parents not allowing their daughters to go to college in such a communally charged atmosphere. “Girls have to study. They have to know what their rights are. Education is the weapon our girls need,” she says, adding that her message is not just for Muslim girls but for all girls out there. “Stand up for your rights. No one is going to do that for you. You have to do that for yourselves.”

She, however, has one request for the media: “Please do not twist the incident out of context and communalise it. I am not fighting a religious battle. I just want to be able to go to college safely and finish my course. My only plan for the time being is to complete my college successfully,” says this future lawyer. Salar News

An ambulance in her name

After the video of Muskan shouting Allah -hu-Akbar went viral, members of the Jamait-ul-Ulema had announced a prize money of Rs 5 lakh to Muskan. “We have not asked anyone for any kind of money or help,” says her father Mohammed Hussain. “In fact, this offer of Rs 5 lakh has come as a complete surprise. My family and I were rather troubled by this gesture. I prayed to Allah for guidance and have decided that we will buy an oxygen-fitted ambulance for our city and donate it to the city authorities in the name of our daughter.”