For activists in Turkey, the headscarf is a women’s rights issue Updated Mar 16, 2021 | 14:36 IST
For a long time, the AKP has viewed headscarf-wearing women as loyalists, and in truth, many were. Representational image | Photo Credit: iStock Images
Turkey has a long history of pigeonholing women. Women who chose to cover their heads were labelled “backward” and uneducated while those who went uncovered represented the modern ideal of a woman bravely rejecting religious conservatism. The headscarf symbolized the battle between the forces of modernity and arch-conservatism. But for a new generation of women, it is as much a political statement about their rights as about their religion.