The anti-hijab wave, with the epicentre of Karnataka, has now hit the shores of Tamil Nadu after a functionary of BJP, which has been in the limelight for its bigotry politics, has urged a Muslim woman to remove the hijab before casting her vote in the Tamil Nadu urban local body polls. The protest from the functionary against wearing hijab had pushed voting into a brief pause and it had later resumed after he was replaced by another functionary. 

The urban local body elections are underway in Tamil Nadu. According to reports, a hijab-clad Muslim woman had arrived at a polling station in the eighth ward of the Melur municipality in Madurai. However, after seeing her with a hijab, BJP agent Girirajan had urged her to remove the hijab before voting. He began clamouring against the woman which had spurred tensions in the polling station.  

Girirajan's action had attracted attention from the election authorities and the functionaries of other parties while the woman braced up a lurch. Several people including the agents of DMK and ADMK had staunchly condemned Girirajan's conduct of opposing the voting right for a woman wearing hijab. After Girirajan had created ruckus and was shouting lonely, he was ousted from the polling station by the election authorities. 

Following the incident, the polling was stopped for thirty minutes and it had then resumed after Girirajan was replaced by another BJP agent. The crucial local body polls in Tamil Nadu are underway as the people are casting their votes to elect the captains to run the local government institutions in urban areas. The weeks of hectic campaigns and tours by the leaders and independent candidates have come to the showdown with voters are now been queuing up to cast their ballots and they will be deciding the fate of thousands of candidates. 

The voting began at 7 am on Saturday - February 19 and it will be held till 6 pm, with the last one hour has been reserved for the voters who have been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. Urban areas across 38 districts have been polling to elect the representatives and the Tamil Nadu Election Commission had installed surveillance cameras to monitor the polling stations and the state government had deployed over 1 lakh police personnel for security purposes. 

As the pollings happen amid the spread of Covid-19, the Election Commission has rolled out adequate measures and instructions and appealed to the people to adhere to them. Voting is taking place in 31,150 polling stations and following the voting, the voting machines will be escorted to the respective counting centres and the votes will be counted on February 22.