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Turkish professor retains headscarf ban
Astronomy professor Esat Rennan Pekünlü waits at the front door to his faculty and will not allow any students wearing headscarves to even enter the building, the Taraf daily reported on Thursday.
In remarks to the Taraf daily on Thursday, Nadide Kazancı, the dean of the Faculty of Sciences, said the faculty does not know how to deal with Professor Pekünlü and added that there are ongoing investigations into the professor, who allegedly harassed a female student in the faculty garden.
On the walls of the faculty building are signs that read “Students who wear headscarves cannot enter [the faculty building].” “He posts those signs on the walls and we remove them as soon as possible,” said Kazancı.
A math student who did not wish to be named told Taraf that the professor stands at the door to the faculty building and does not permit students wearing headscarves to enter. The student recounted: “He takes photos of students wearing headscarves and humiliates them. I once tried to attend his class wearing a wig [over a headscarf], but he rejected it and told me to get out of the room.”
The headscarf ban has been one of the most controversial issues in the country as the secular establishment has vigorously barred the wearing of headscarves in schools and government settings for a long time, interpreting it as an expression of religious identity in the public sphere where ideological or religious expression by a group or individual is forbidden.
Opponents of the ban, liberal intellectuals and conservatives think that such a ban contravenes fundamental rights as it deprives some of their right to education.
Although the ban was lifted in 2010 by YÖK, it is still arbitrarily applied at some universities.
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