Members of the Sikh community in France participating in a protest earlier this year against the move to ban religious symbols, including turbans worn by Sikh students, in public schools across the country. (File Photo: AFP)

Come September, Sikh boys studying in French public schools will have to replace their turbans with hairnets, as a result of a new law banning religious symbols in such educational institutions, The Straits Times reported from Paris, quoting Associated Press.

That was the message delivered by French Education Minister Francois Fillon on May 17, in the wake of the adoption of a set of guidelines to help schools apply a law that was enacted in March after a lengthy debate in Parliament.

The law bans conspicuous religious symbols and attire in the classroom such as Muslim headscarves, Jewish skull caps and large Christian crosses.

Fillon said that under the guidelines, Muslim girls can only wear bandannas in schools that allow them to do so. Even in such cases, if students overtly attach religious significance to bandannas, they would be banned, the minister was quoted as saying in the report. Going beyond attire, the guidelines also forbid students from declining some courses, such as physical education or biology, for religious reasons or rejecting professors based on their gender, according to the report.

When asked about turbans worn by Sikhs, the minister said that an ‘arrangement’ had been made whereby students belonging to the community and reading at public schools would wear hairnets in place of turbans.

The community had decided in favor of hairnets which is “less aggressive, less showy,” Fillon was quoted as saying in the report.

Representatives of the tiny Sikh community in France, numbering 5,000-7,000, however, asserted that they were unaware of any such arrangement. Instead, the Sikhs said that a counsellor to Prime Minister Jean-Pierrre Raffarin had sent them a letter, dated May 10, that provided “conditional assurance” that Sikh boys could wear turbans in class.

Karamvir Singh, a Paris resident and member of the organization named United Sikhs, was quoted as saying in The Straits Times that Sikhs were told they could wear turbans because they never posed problems.

Hardyal Singh, who lives in New York and is the director of United Sikhs, said that having to wear a hairnet would be appalling for Sikhs as it has no place and no meaning for them.

Earlier this year, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin struck a conciliatory note on the subject during a visit to the Indian capital in March, in the wake of noisy protests by members of the Sikh and Muslim communities.

Speaking immediately after talks with Indian leaders in New Delhi, Villepin had then expressed confidence that a solution would be found that would be satisfactory to the Sikh community in France.

The minister was also quoted in news reports as having told Tarlochan Singh, head of India’s National Commission for Minorities that the French government would seek “practical solutions” to the problem.

(Compiled from news dispatches by Charles Isaac)