19-Year-Old Girl Wrapped In Curtain Before Taking Exam. Here's The Bizarre Reason for It

Assam Girl Wrapped In Curtain: In Tezpur area, a 19-year-old girl was harassed, ridiculed and schooled about common sense when all she aimed to do was to appear for an entrance test.

The girl named Jublee Tamuli reached Girijananda Chowdhury Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences (GIPS) on September 15 to sit for the entrance test for Assam Agricultural University (AAU). She had reportedly travelled two hours to reach the exam centre and for the most bizarre reason she was stopped from taking the test. The authorities could have not have a female candidate wearing shorts in the exam hall.

The girl was losing time as the paper had already started, she was crying when the exam controller asked her to arrange a pair of full pants if she wants to give the exam. Her father had to travel eight kilometres to buy those pants meanwhile the authorities had given a curtain to the girl to cover her legs. A 19-year-old girl's bare legs were seen as such a blunder that they had to be covered?

While talking to Indian Express, the girl said that the curtain kept slipping when she was writing the exam and gave her a lot of stress. Most importantly, she was humiliated as any self-respecting individual would be. When asked about the incident, the Principal of GIPS, Dr Abdul Baquee Ahmed told the daily, "There is no rule about shorts, but during an exam, it is important that decorum be maintained. Parents should also know better." How were a pair of shorts disrupting the decorum of the exam hall?

So many educational institutions across the country bully and humiliate little girls in the name of maintaining discipline. Teenage girls in schools are made to feel conscious about their bodies when teachers point out the length of their skirts, the fitting of their shirts and the "proper placing" of the dupattas. School girls are sometimes slut shamed just for styling their hair a certain way. Even adult women are said to maintain a 'dress code' by giving the pretext of professionalism and what not.

What is the motive behind imposing such restrictions? Some institutions have said that they keep such rules to protest women from men. But what about the actual reports which are proof that women are raped, molested, harassed regardless of the outfit they wear?

Policing women for their outfits is not protecting them in any way. It is just one more limitation that stops them from choosing for themselves and from being themselves. In case of Jublee Tamuli, she was stopped from giving the exam as per her convenience. If it affects her performance in the entrance test, who is going to take its responsibility?

Picture by Unsplash. Only for representational purposes