In fact Burqa,
A burqa (Arabic pronunciation: [ˈbʊrqaʕ]; also transliterated burkha, burka or burqua from Arabic: برقع burqu‘ or burqa‘ ) is an enveloping outer garment worn by women in some Islamic traditions and, since 2007, by a few hundred ultra-orthodox Jewish women for the purpose of hiding a woman's body when in public. It is worn over the usual daily clothing (often a long dress or a shalwar kameez) and removed when the woman returns home (see purdah), out of the view of men that are not her family. The burqa is usually understood to be the woman's loose body-covering (Arabic: jilbāb), plus the head-covering (Arabic: ḥijāb, taking the most usual meaning), plus the face-veil (Arabic: niqāb). The word comes from the Arabic root /r/+/q/+/ʕ/, which means "to patch up" or "to sew up". The face-veil portion is usually a rectangular piece of semi-transparent cloth whose top side is sewn to corresponding portion of the head-scarf, so that the veil hangs down loose from the scarf, and it can be turned up if the woman wishes to reveal her face (otherwise the whole face would be covered). In other cases, the niqāb part can be a side-attached cloth that covers the face below the eyes' region.
The face-veil portion is also called purdah ([pərd̪aː]), a Persian word meaning "curtain".
Origin
The Arabic word 'برقع' refers to a face cover with eye openings. It does not mean the whole black dress called the Abaya.
Further information: Sex segregation and Islam
An 1842 Lithography work by James Rattray showing a Persian (Qizilbash) woman in Afghanistan with a burqa next to her.
There is evidence that this type of dress was worn by some Arab and Persian women long before Islam. For example, the Roman African Christian Tertullian, writing in Chapter 17 of The Veiling of Virgins around 200 AD, praises the modesty of those "pagan women of Arabia" who "not only cover their head, but their whole face...preferring to enjoy half the light with one eye rather than prostituting their whole face."Strabo, writing in the first century AD, also refers to covering the face as a practice of some Persian women (Geography 11.13. 9-10).
Many Muslims believe that the Islamic holy book, the Qur'an, and the collected traditions of the life of Muhammed, or hadith, require both men and women to dress and behave modestly in public. However, this requirement, called hijab, has been interpreted in many different ways by Islamic scholars (ulema) and Muslim communities (see Women and Islam).
The Quran has been translated as stating:
"O Prophet! Say to your wives and your daughters and the women of the faithful to draw their outergarments (jilbabs) close around themselves; that is better that they will be recognized and not annoyed. And God is ever Forgiving, Gentle."
Qur'an- Surah/Chapter Al-Ahzab Ayah/Verse 59
Another verse in the Quran is translated as:
"And say to the faithful women to lower their gazes, and to guard their private parts, and not to display their beauty except what is apparent of it, and to extend their headcoverings (khimars) to cover their bosoms (jaybs), and not to display their beauty except to their husbands, or their fathers, or their husband's fathers, or their sons, or their husband's sons, or their brothers, or their brothers' sons, or their sisters' sons, or their womenfolk, or what their right hands rule (slaves), or the followers from the men who do not feel sexual desire, or the small children to whom the nakedness of women is not apparent, and not to strike their feet (on the ground) so as to make known what they hide of their adornments. And turn in repentance to Allah together, O you the faithful, in order that you are successful"
Qur'an- Sura Nur Chapter: The Light. Verse 31
Fatwa
A fatwa, written by Sheikh Muhammed Salih Al-Munajjid on the Saudi Arabian website Islam QA, states:
The correct view as indicated by the evidence is that the woman’s face is ‘awrah which must be covered. It is the most tempting part of her body, because what people look at most is the face, so the face is the greatest ‘awrah of a woman.
The fatwa also states when it is prohibited to wear the veil:
In the Sunnah there are many ahaadeeth[clarification needed], such as: the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said: “The woman in ihraam[clarification needed] is forbidden to veil her face (wear niqaab) or to wear the burqa’.” This indicates that when women were not in ihraam, women used to cover their faces
Namus
In the Muslim world, preventing women from being seen by men is closely linked to the concept of Namus.
Namus is an ethical category, a virtue, in Middle Eastern Muslim patriarchal character. It is a strongly gender-specific category of relations within a family described in terms of honor, attention, respect/respectability, and modesty. The term is often translated as "honor".
Afghanistan and Northwest Pakistan
Two women wearing shuttlecock burqas.
The full Afghan chadri covers the wearer's entire face except for a small region about the eyes, which is covered by a concealing net or grille. This type of covering is also common in North Western Pakistan close to the Afghan border. In Pakistan, it is often called a "shuttlecock burqa", to differentiate it from other burqa styles.
Before the Taliban took power in Afghanistan, the chadri was infrequently worn in cities. While they were in power, the Taliban treatment of women required the wearing of a chadri in public. Officially, it is not required under the present Afghan regime, but local warlords still enforce it in southern Afghanistan. Burqa use in the remainder of Afghanistan is variable and is observed to be gradually declining in Kabul. Due to political instability in these areas, women who might not otherwise be inclined to wear the chadri must do so as a matter of personal safety.
In Pakistan, the use of the burqa has declined over the time. The cities of Rawalpindi, Sargodha, Multan, Hyderabad, Peshawar and Quetta were overwhelmingly seen as cities of Burqa-clad women at the time of Independence. However, burqa use still persists in rural areas of the Northwest Frontier Province, some adjoining areas of Punjab and Balochistan. Smaller cities like Mianwali in Punjab have exclusive burqa-observances as part of orthodox traditions.
Israel
In parts of Israel, several hundred ultra-orthodox Jewish women have taken to wearing the burqa to protect their chastity. This has drawn some criticism from Rabbis who wish to declare the burqa an item of sexual deviancy and ban Jewish women from wearing them.
Syria
Burqa is not allowed to be worn in Syrian schools and universities by either students, teachers or staff.
Western Europe
Wikinews has related news: Sarkozy states burqa to be "not welcome" in France
Main article: Islamic dress controversy in Europe
Although cultural and not of Islamic teachings, face covering veils have become linked to Islam and its followers. Face-covering clothing has become a controversial political issue in Western Europe, and some intellectuals and political groups advocate prohibition, for various reasons.
This type of dress that covers the face of women is causing controversy in the United Kingdom (see main article at United Kingdom debate over veils). A senior member of the government, Jack Straw, asked Muslim women from his constituency to remove any veils covering their faces during face-to-face meetings with him. He explained to the media that this was a request, not a demand, and that he made sure that a woman staffer remained in the room during the meeting. A media furor followed. Some Muslim groups said that they understood his concerns, but others rejected them as prejudicial. A poll in 2010 indicated that 67 percent on British people supported banning the Burqa in all public places.
Wearing the burqa has been banned in French public schools since 2004, the result of a law that prohibits students from wearing any clearly visible religious symbols. This was followed on 22 June 2009, when the president of France, Nicolas Sarkozy, said that burqas are "not welcome" in France, commenting that "In our country, we cannot accept that women be prisoners behind a screen, cut off from all social life, deprived of all identity". The French National Assembly appointed 32 lawmakers from right- and left-wing parties to a six-month fact-finding mission to look at ways of restricting its use. On 26 January 2010, the commission reported that access to public services and public transport should be barred to those wearing the burqa. On Tuesday July 13, 2010 the Assembly overwhelmingly approved a bill banning burqas and niqabs.
The Netherlands seek to propose a country-wide ban as well. On 29 April 2010, the lower house of parliament in Belgium passed a bill banning any clothing that would obscure the identity of the wearer in places like parks and in the street. The proposal was passed nem con and now goes to the Senate. BBC News estimates that "Only around 30 women wear this kind of veil in Belgium, out of a Muslim population of around half a million."
In Europe, at least one crime has been committed by men or women using a burqa as a disguise.
(source:wikipedia)
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