Dargah committee will now have to come up with progressive reforms: Shamina Shafiq

Welcoming the Supreme Court's order to allow the entry of women into the Haji Ali Dargah in Mumbai, former National for Commission (NCW) member Shamina Shafiq said the dargah committee will now have to introspect and come up with some progressive reforms.

"What the honourable court has said is something that the Dargah committee has to introspect upon. The entry of women into the Dargah was not always banned. It was just one fine day that the committee decided that women should not be allowed to enter because of certain reasons that are so superficial," she told ANI.

"The reasons that were given were that sometimes there are men who misbehave with women and that is why women should not enter the same premises as that of men. So, I think, men should have been banned and not women. It was a very regressive thought and that is why the comment of the honourable court is a welcome move," she added.

She said that the Dargah committee should respect the equality that is already enshrined in the principles of Islam and women are not asking something new but reiterating what is already mentioned in the religion.

The Supreme Court yesterday stayed the high court order after the Haji Ali Dargah management said that it will come out with a progressive stand in two weeks.

"Dargah needs to do some secular introspection and come out with a progressive stand on women's entry into Haji Ali," the apex court bench said.

"Be it Islam or Hinduism, we need to look progressively at customs," the apex court observed.

On October 4, the Haji Ali Dargah Trust moved Supreme Court challenging the Bombay High Court order lifting the ban on women from entering the sanctum sanctorum of the renowned Muslim shrine in south Bombay.

The high court on August 26 had held that the ban imposed by the Dargah Trust contravened Articles 14, 15 and 25 of the Constitution and said women should be permitted to enter like men.

The ruling came after a public interest litigation called for removing the restriction on women not being allowed into the inner sanctum which houses the tomb of Iranian saint Pir Haji Ali Shah Bukhari.

The ban was imposed in 2012 by the Haji Ali Dargah Trust.