Woman's Hour - Women protest in India over hijab bans, Comedian, Isabelle Farah, Parents attacked by their children,

Episode Date: February 17, 2022

Schools in the Indian state of Karnataka reopened yesterday after protests broke out in response to the state government trying to ban women wearing the hijab in classrooms. The issue gained widespread attention after videos and images of girls wearing hijab getting heckled while being denied entry to school went viral. Protestors took to the streets to condemn the decision, and women have marched in solidarity in cities across India. Divya Arya, BBC woman’s affairs journalist and Sumayyah Khan, a law student at the Aligarh Muslim University in Uttar Pradesh join Krupa Padhy.It's been announced that children aged between 5 and 11 in all four nations of the UK are to be offered a low dose of the covid vaccine. Children are at a much lower risk of becoming severely ill from a Covid infection, so the health benefits of vaccinating them are smaller than in other age-groups. Also, many will have some protection from already having caught the virus. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), which advises governments across the UK, have been weighing up the evidence for immunising five to 11-year-olds. It concluded vaccination should go ahead to prevent a "very small number of children from serious illness and hospitalisation" in a future wave of Covid. Dr Elizabeth Mann, an immunologist at the Lydia Becker Institute at the University of Manchester and Naomi Grimley, BBC Global Health Correspondent discuss.Isabelle Farah is a British Lebanese actor, comedian, and writer. Following an undergraduate degree in French and Film Studies, she trained as a classical actress. She started doing stand up comedy in 2017 and has since gigged across the UK and internationally. Her one woman comedy show, Ellipsis, about grief, authenticity and punchlines, enjoyed a sell-out run at the Edinburgh Fringe last summer, and is currently on at the Pleasance Theatre in London. She explains the personal event that inspired it.New research funded by the Home Office has found that a tenth of domestic abuse cases involve parents being attacked by their children. These findings are based on almost 67,000 reports investigated by Lancashire police, of which 7,171 involved a child over 16 abusing a parent or parental figure. The reports show that abuse was more likely to be intimidating or coercive behaviour than outright violence and the age of the abuser averaged at 27 years old. Nicola Graham-Kevan is a professor of criminal justice psychology at the University of Central Lancashire and led the research. Kat Wilson is a senior support worker at Woman's Aid.Presenter: Krupa Padhy Producer: Kirsty StarkeyInterviewed Guest: Dr Elizabeth Mann Interviewed Guest: Naomi Grimley Interviewed Guest: Divya Arya Interviewed Guest: Summayyah Khan Interviewed Guest: Isabelle Farah Interviewed Guest: Nicola Graham-Kevan Interviewed Guest: Kat Wilson

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2. And of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme. Peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, this is Krupal Bharti and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. Hello, welcome to the programme. Good to have your company on this Thursday morning. After many months of debate and research on whether or not young children in the UK should get the COVID-19 vaccine, we now have an outcome. Yesterday we heard from ministers that all children aged between 5 to 11, now that's around 6 million people, will be offered the jab from April. And we understand that vaccinating your children is a hugely sensitive issue and you may not have made up your mind on the matter yet. We know it's been billed a non-urgent offer but

what does that exactly mean? We'll help you find out with the help of Dr. Elizabeth Mann, who is also on hand to answer any of your questions or comments on this key development. Also, outlets to grief. What has helped you on your healing journey? I know I've turned to writing letters to a loved one who's passed away. Others may choose music, poetry or sport. And in the case of our guest, Isabel Fara, following the death of her young cousin, it was comedy that helped.

We're going to learn about Isabel's successful show, Ellipsis, but I'd also like to hear your stories. What medium has ultimately helped you when it comes to tackling grief, conventional or unconventional? Because as we are often told, there is no right or wrong way to grieve. And you might have heard about the tensions in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, where six Muslim teenagers at a government-run college

were barred from classes for wearing their headscarves. There have been protests across the country since, and for many days the state government shut down high schools and colleges. Our women's affairs reporter in India will explain more and we'll hear from a young Muslim student in another state about her experience. But as I was saying it's been announced that children aged between 5 and 11 in all four nations of the UK are to be offered a low dose of the Covid-19 vaccine. We know that children are at much lower risk of becoming severely ill from a COVID infection,

so the health benefits of vaccinating them are smaller than in other age groups. Also, many will have some protection from having already caught the virus. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, also known as the JCVI, which advises the government across the UK, have been weighing up the evidence

for immunising 5 to 11 year olds. And it concluded that the vaccinations should go ahead to prevent, I quote, a very small number of children from serious illness and hospitalisation in a future wave of COVID. Well, let's get into this a bit more. I'm joined now by our global health correspondent, Naomi Grimley, and Dr Elizabeth Mann, who's an immunologist at the Lydia Becker Institute at the University of Manchester. Thank you both for joining us.

Dr. Mann, let me start with you. Talk us through what is being proposed in terms of the type of vaccine and the dose for children. So the vaccine that's being given to children in this age group, the five to 11, it's the Pfizer vaccine, the mRNA vaccine. So I think, as you said, it's the risk and the benefit ratio. And as you say, it's something that regards thinking about because most children do get mild disease. Most children don't get particularly sick, but some do.

And there have been children that have died. There's 25 children that died in the first year of the pandemic. Six of those didn't have any underlying health conditions. So the vaccinations are really to protect those children, although it's unlikely they're going to get severely ill and die. It's to protect those that might do. The dose is lower, as you say, because children do have a very good immune response. It's better than it is in adults. And that's why they don't get as sick as adults.

But it means that they'll be able to mount a really good, strong, protective response with a lower dose of the vaccine. There's been early work that's been done by Pfizer with thousands of children that have looked at how they respond to this low dose and the safety data and it looks like they do actually get milder side effects from the vaccine even to the higher age group that's 16 to 25 so they get less severe symptoms so the headaches the fevers the fatigue and fewer of them actually get side effects so it looks like this initial safety data is very promising I think because the side effects are so rare, that's a good thing, but it means it's very difficult to get big scale data because to see that kind of one in a million side effect,

you obviously need to then vaccinate a million children. So what's weighed up is really that it's been predicted that there may be an adverse effect in fewer than two children. Your line's crackling there slightly. We will try to get that steadied slightly. Benefits of a vaccine that's more severe than Omicron and about 20%...

OK, what I'm going to do is try and get your line re-established there slightly, Doctor, because it is breaking up slightly. But let me cross to Naomi Grimley, our health correspondent, because we are going to unpick much of what Dr Mann has said there about it being rolled out here in the UK. But of course, we are not the first country around the world to be grappling with this, to be having these conversations. In many places around the world, the vaccine rollout for young people has already started. That's right. Yes. In fact, Britain is pretty late to the party on this because most countries in Western Europe and North America have been

vaccinating the five to 11 yearolds since December and certainly throughout January. So one of the questions is, why is the UK deciding to do this much later than other countries? But there are exceptions. Sweden, for example, looked at the evidence, and they weren't convinced that the benefits outweighed the risks. So they've decided not to do it and assuming instead that children will gain immunity through natural infection. Some countries are going further, though. China, Cuba, UAE. These are countries which are actually vaccinating the under fives, too. And indeed, the Pfizer pharmaceutical company is now looking at a vaccine which it hopes to get approval for in the US for those from the

age two upwards. I understand that some of those children receiving the vaccine are as young as three years old. To many, that may seem extremely young. Yeah, well, this is one of the things that you get if you talk to parents. We did some interviews outside a school gate in the West Midlands yesterday. And there are concerns from parents about whether it's too young. I guess experts would counter that by saying, well, A, we have this massive body of global evidence now about how these vaccines have been used around the world to vaccinate so many small people. And also they would argue that, of course, there are all kinds of childhood vaccinations that we don't think twice about getting in normal times.

Do stay with us, Naomi. And I should say to our audience that if you would like to send in a question or comment on any of what we are discussing on the matter of children and the COVID-19 vaccine jab, please do. The way to do that is via social media. We are at BBC Women's Hour on Twitter, on Instagram.

You can send us a text message. 84844 is the way to do that. And of course, you can also email us via our website as well. But let me connect back to you, Dr. Elizabeth Mann. Thank you for staying with us. We were talking about the dosage there. You were saying that it's only a fraction of the adult dose that young children would be getting. Does that mean that they'll need another second shot sooner?

No. So with the rationale between giving the children a smaller dose is they've got very, very good immune systems and much more robust immunologically than adults. And that's why they don't get as sick when they actually get COVID. But it means that when they're given the vaccine, they'll generate a very, very good protective response. They don't need as much. So they won't need more boosters than you'd be having as an adult. They'll actually generate very good immunity. And actually, evidence suggests that they'll generate longer sustained immunity. So the actual beneficial effects versus adults will potentially be better and longer lasting, which will obviously impact on schools and things. I spotted this message that I want to put you from a mum online seeking some advice on getting her young children vaccinated. She says,

both my children are under the age of 12 and both have had COVID. So I'd assume that they now have antibodies. Should they still get the jab? Yes. So you're right. They will have antibodies and that means they'll have a level of immune protection. We know that that wanes after a period of time. And what gives you great protection actually is if you're vaccinated and you've had a prior infection that actually gives the strongest response in terms of protection against more strains of covid and further reinfection and one of the key points here is wanting to protect children against the next waves that come so we know that you know this isn't the end after omicron we're going to be getting more waves of covid

hopefully the next wave will be as mild as COVID is, but it might not be. And it's that protection against further reinfection. If you vaccinate, especially if you've had a previous infection, that gives you very, very, very good protection going forward. I did push out our social media details. Happy to say we've had a listener get in touch who writes, has anyone done a cost benefit analysis

on the cost of vaccinating all schoolchildren for one variant versus air filtration in schools, which reduces the spread of all airborne disease using the hashtag clean air in schools? You may not have the answer to the to the finances of that, but it is a factor that you were tapping into there. The idea of preventing another variant. Yeah. So, as you said, I don't have the information on the finances and the airflow and the ventilation. I know that's something that we've obviously incorporated into all our workplaces. And it does. That is something that makes a huge difference to preventing infections. You know, open windows, making sure you've got airflow through where people are sitting for long periods of time. So it's a very, very good point.

And I think that combined with the vaccination programme should make a big difference here. But what we're hearing from messages like from our listener there is that parents are concerned. There is anxiety around this. What sort of an uptake are you as a medical professional expecting here? Yeah, that's a really good question. It's something we were talking about the other day. And I think there's lots of different angles here and there's lots of different types of benefits. There's obviously the benefit to children themselves. And as I've said, the protection against the next wave that comes along. On a bigger picture, there's that just

getting back into a normal routine, not having to be off school all the time, parents not having to stay off work all the time. And I think I'm hoping that that's something will increase uptake as well as the actual health benefit. It's a huge benefit to children to not be off school and to keep getting this disruption to their development and their learning. There's also evidence now that children can get long COVID, which isn't a huge surprise. You know, children get glandular fever, for example, after other viral infections. And these effects of fatigue and long running post viral things can last months. We don't know if they can even last years. And all these things can be so disruptive to learning and development. There's that aspect of things, which I think will mean there is a good

uptake in this country, but it's just very, very difficult to know, to be honest. If we look at data from the States, for example, started off very strong with vaccinating five to 11s, and then it really dropped off and it's come in peaks and troughs. So it's very hard to say. Naomi, let me bring you back in here. How have other countries dealt with that anxiety that some parents may feel about vaccinating their young children? Well, Lizzie's right that some countries have seen their uptake of childhood vaccinations for COVID much slower than adults.

And in fact, in France, they've had problems because it's become politicised. So politicians on the far right in the general election campaign have been, the presidential election campaign, have been saying that, you know, they believe it's wrong to get children vaccinated and so forth. But I think the main thing is for health authorities to offer the reassurance and to explain about the safety data. As I mentioned, this vaccine has now been used right around the world. And the UK is to some extent late to the party on this one. So it does benefit from the fact that there's a lot of data now that we've got globally,

which will help to reassure parents here. Let me bring in this message from a listener, Anne, who's sent us an email. I heard people saying that children's immunity is strong and that vaccines are probably not needed. But I thought that children's immunity system is not fully functional until they are seven years old. So I'm left wondering what's really the case, that one for you, Dr Mann? Right, yeah, that's a good question question so children's you're right that so in very very early life children haven't developed their full immune system yet which is why babies for example are it's more dangerous when they get infections such as flu but children within the first few years of life do develop a very robust immune response and we

don't actually it's still being investigated why that sort of changes around adolescence presumably that's something that's hormone related um that's under wide investigation but there's that period of childhood immune responses are much stronger than they are in adulthood so not sort of super early life but certainly school-age children do have very robust immune responses. And as you say, they do respond well to infections, but they will be much better protected if they have that vaccination combined with a prior infection. And there's potentially going to actually have much long lasting protection compared to adults. Well, let's talk about that long lasting protection. Another tweet that's come through to us. Childhood vaccines are often a one off. The COVID vaccine only lasts for less than a year. and this is actually going to really depend on what the uptake is it sounds like it's unrelated but there's the sort of direct effects to each child as I've mentioned but this kind of general

protection if the uptake's high the levels of the virus will become very low and once the actual infection levels are under a certain point it's not going to be prevalent and it may be that people don't need to be vaccinated as often because there just isn't that much virus around. But we think with COVID, because it is so infectious, and it's not going to be 100% of children taking the vaccine up, it is always going to be to some degree within the schools and around. So I think, as you say, it may be that children do need to be vaccinated once, twice a year. Again, it's really, really going to depend on the level of uptake and what the actual levels of infections within the population are.

A lot of listeners, a lot of parents asking about side effects. Not surprisingly, of course. Naomi, what have we seen play out in other countries around the world? Sorry, could you repeat the question? In terms of global side effects, in terms of what we have seen in other countries, there's been lots of concerns about conditions like myocarditis. What have we seen in terms of real data globally when it comes to side effects and children taking the jab? Yeah, well, the government advisors here in the UK were very clear yesterday that the risk of myocarditis, which is this inflammation of the heart, is very rare and rarer than it is for children to be hospitalized with COVID.

And that's precisely why they've made the decision that they have. What's interesting is that mild side effects, as Lizzie said, do happen. So, for example, if you look at the US, around 10% of kids had to take a day off school after their vaccination because they were feeling flu-y or miserable, as some adults have done. Now, that, interestingly, was taken into account by the UK advisors here because obviously that means school absences too. So when you're weighing up these things,

you have to think about mild side effects and what that means for children losing out on classroom time. But as regards myocarditis, they seem very less worried about that. And that's why they've decided to make this decision in line with most developed countries now. Naomi Grimley, our BBC health correspondent and Dr Elizabeth Mann, an immunologist at the Lydia Becker Institute at the University of Manchester.

Thank you so much for answering some of our audience questions there and exploring some of the details of that development. Lots of you have been getting in touch with questions and comments and I'll try and get to them a little later in the programme. But for now, let's turn our attention to South Asia, where schools in the Indian state of Karnataka reopened yesterday after protests broke out last month when six teenage girls at a government-run college were barred from classes for wearing their headscarves. The issue gained widespread attention after videos and images of girls wearing the hijab being denied entry to their classes went viral online. Protesters then took to the streets to condemn the actions and women have marched in solidarity in cities across India and the issue has inflamed Hindu and Muslim tensions as students from both sides

clashed during the protests. Women in Karnataka are now anxiously awaiting for the High Court to make a ruling in the coming days on this matter. Well, let's speak to Divya Arya, the BBC Women's Affairs Journalist in India, and Sumaya Khan, a law student at the Aligarh Muslim University in the North Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, both joining me now. Thank you for your time. Divya, let me start with you. A complex story. You've been in Karnataka in recent days. Take us back to the beginning of these tensions and how this all began. Thanks, Krupa. It is indeed a very complex story, not merely because such passions are involved and people feel so strongly about it. We've seen some really young students come out and, you know, these are students who are studying

alongside each other and they have felt so strongly about the issue that they've had these, maybe not very violent confrontations, but very aggressive confrontations, which were honestly very worrying to watch,, 17 year olds. It all began at a government run college in this coastal town, Udupi, from where I returned just yesterday night in Karnataka. And it's called a college, it's called a pre-university college. So it's not really a bachelor's degree that the girls are doing there, but really students from grade eight to grade 12. So this is pretty much a school in normal parlance. And because the school was shut, because COVID had induced a really long lockdown and India has been one of the countries which has been taking its time to reopen schools,

these six students who had not really attended real classes and were only doing online classes, when they joined back school, they realized that classes before them, girls had been allowed to wear hijab. But they had been told that the school policy has changed and they cannot wear a hijab in classrooms. And that's when they protested. But conversations between their parents, school authorities, and the government, which has a right of say in the rules for uniform in government colleges. Those talks did not lead to any breakthrough. Eventually, the girls went to the state high court, which as we speak, is continuing to hear their petitions

about the right to wear hijab inside classrooms. Now, the sad part is that this wasn't so peaceful as I'm narrating it. Once they went to court and the word spread to other colleges, students who were not Muslim, mostly Hindu students, protested the girls' demand and they came to colleges, different colleges, not that particular college because that is an only girls' college. But in other places across the state and later even in different parts of the country, they came with saffron colored shawls and turbans. Saffron is a symbol of Hinduism, a color which is considered sacred in Hinduism, though there is no rule about wearing it anywhere, even in temples. But it was a symbolic protest where they said that if you're going to bring

religion into the class, we're also going to bring our religion into the class. And that's when we saw really heated confrontations. Eventually, the state government shut all colleges. Only yesterday, colleges have reopened and it hasn't been easy, even the reopening. And this has impacted people across the country. It's opened up a debate across the country and we have seen protests across the country, haven't we? Indeed, it's become a question of the right to religious expression and it's touched a chord among students across the country, especially in areas which have a more dominant Muslim population,

in areas which saw an outspoken resurgence of Muslim women. I should underscore a couple of years back when we first saw the protest for a citizenship law, against a citizenship law that many feared would take away citizenship from Muslim citizens. So we saw a lot of Muslim women come out in many areas, something we had not seen in the recent past, though Muslim women have been assertive earlier as well. So those areas especially have seen women come out again and join this demand to wear hijab inside classrooms that originated in the southern Indian Karnataka state. Let me bring in Sumaiya. You are a Muslim woman who wears the hijab to university. You are in a different state. And it is important to stress that each state in India has its own

politics, its own culture, its own dynamics. You're in the north. These tensions are in the south, Sumaya. But how has this situation impacted you? See, I won't say that it's something new for me because we have seen in the past that the way this current regime, the ruling party has oppressed the minority of this country, be it during the time when the cow slaughtering was done and people were killed on the streets, they were lynched. Then the, like, how Divya mentioned during the time of citizenship when the anti-NRC and NCA movements happened.

So it's nothing new for me. It's how, but yes, it's pretty bad. It's really bad because I really fear moving out of my home. I don't know what's going to happen next with me for just covering, I mean, just moving this piece of cover on my head. And that's really bizarre. Yes, we've been talking, Sumaya, about some of those videos that are being shared online. In one of them, I remember seeing

a female student who's wearing her headscarf. She's seen walking away from a very large group of young men wearing those saffron-coloured scarves that Divya mentioned there. She's very bold. She responds to them with a Islamic chant and she's responding to what seems like very aggressive taunts. This must worry you. Could you please repeat? Some of the videos we've seen, Sumaya, have been quite scary. How do you feel about them uh like scary like the the people who are disrobing the women the people who are hattling these little girls for just practicing

their religion is absolutely scary because just it shouldn't be seen like it's happening because of just the piece of cover that you are the piece of cloth that you are using on your head but it's happening because of just the piece of cover that you are the piece of cloth that you are using on your head but it's how they are you know using their power how they're using uh their um i mean being into the majority and oppressing the minority and the women that's really bad and it's really scary it fears me it fears me because this is just the starting this is just the beginning tomorrow today they are coming up with hijab tomorrow they'll come up with something new it's not going to stop if it's going like this and people are not really coming up on the street not just the minority that is being attacked but the people who become citizens of this nation

should come up on the street and they should speak up for us so that's when the situations will change otherwise it's just a bad day every day and we'll come up and we street and they should speak up for us. That's when the situations will change. Otherwise, it's just a bad day every day. And we'll come up and we'll wake up and we'll just see these news around us. And we should say, though, on that thought that you've just put to us there, that there have been, yes, Hindus protesting, yes, Muslims protesting, but also Hindus who have been supporting Muslims and vice versa. So that's a really important point to stress as well. Divya, you've been in Karnataka in recent days,

and I imagine speaking to some of these young girls, what did they have to say? Well, I spoke to Hindu girls as well as Muslim girls because I also wanted to understand what is motivating them to be part of these protests, which when I use the word aggressive, I don't use it lightly. We saw students climb up walls, get into campuses, even when they were stopped. And the chants that they used have, you know, in recent days,

sort of acquired a very, like I think Sumaya was saying, it's scary to see them being voiced, you know, like one of the chants is Jai Shri Ram, which translates into Hail the Lord Rama. And it was never meant to be a war cry. But the way it is chanted now, or another chant is Vande Matram, which is really pride for our own country. But the way it is chanted, it's not a pleasant thing. And then, of course, tempers would rise. And then you would see Muslim girls also, when they're saying we want justice, just the tone and tenor of that. So the whole confrontation, I really wanted to understand

what was driving these students. And I spoke to some girls, some Hindu girls, and they all stress that they have no qualms with Muslim girls. They said that they have friends who are Muslim, that they do not discriminate when they make friends and that they have seen women sit with hijabs inside their classrooms for many months because there are different rules in different colleges in Karnataka. And this came out through a government college

and most private institutes actually allow hijabs inside classrooms. So it was very confusing to then understand why they were part of these protests. And that brings me to the point that we must remember that coastal Karnataka, where all of this started, has been very polarized on communal lines for the past two or three decades now. And this is really a shift we see in the whole country, as we see the rise of the Hindu right wing and we see riots, which first happened in 1992 in Uttar Pradesh from where Sumaya country, then riots in 2002 in Gujarat, in all of which the Muslim minority was targeted. So this led to a lot of polarization, which has

also happened in coastal Karnataka. Now that has, of course, in a way, you know, increased religiosity in the whole region. So we see student organizations now on campus which have become very popular and these are both student organizations from which are supportive of the hindutva or the hindu right ideology and also to to a large extent the muslim conservative thought because you know the right creates space for the right in both religions and that's what it seems the students were getting influenced with and those hindu girls said we were fine up until now, but now this matter has made us realize that we need to stand for our religion. And similarly, you know, Muslim students, I feel, would have taken a more moderate stand, but because the whole thing has really ratcheted up, that it's really hard for

anyone to walk back from where they are. And there certainly feels like there's no end in sight here at the moment, Divya. But of course, we are expecting a High Court ruling. When are we expecting that? So what do you think the outcome might be? In fact, even before the High Court ruling, which, to be honest, may take a few days, because now a core constitutional principle is being debated in the court, which is the right to religious freedom of religious expression. And the court wants to take a very carefully considered stand, like we've seen, because passions are so, you know, it's so polarized on the ground,

whichever way the court leans is going to be quite controversial. In the interim, the court has said that the status quo should be maintained and institutes which did not allow any religious clothing, students should not demand that they be allowed to wear any religious clothing in those institutes. But what has happened is that this has not been understood clearly across the state. So a lot of private institutes which allowed hijab are not allowing students in with a hijab. So since yesterday, when colleges reopened, and even today, just a few hours back, I've been getting these reports where Muslim girls have been turned back from these private institutes, because the college administration is saying that the court

has asked them not to allow any religious clothing. So a lot of confusion persists on the ground. Protests are continuing, smaller in measure, and classes have reopened. So a lot of confusion persists on the ground. Protests are continuing, smaller in measure, and classes have reopened. So that sense of being discriminated is even more because Muslim girls now are saying, well, you've allowed colleges to reopen, but we can't go to class. Sumaya, let me let you have the final word here. As a young Muslim student there in India. What's it been like for you studying? And I was speaking to one young Muslim girl in India last week who said that she grew up saying the Gayatri Mantra, which is a Hindu prayer in school.

She had no problem with that. She lived harmoniously. Just talk us through what the reality for you is like on that campus when you go in? See, I have done my schooling from a convent, a missionary school. And there in the morning, the carols were singing. I actually had no problem with it. There was so much tolerance. In fact, the people who were sitting just right to me,

we were not knowing whether he or she is a Muslim or a Hindu or a Sikh. We never had this thing in our mind. We were just students. We were're going we were accessing education but now how the environment has become because with all of the things that's happening that's really problematic I mean the students that are going now in the colleges in the Udupi district in the Karnataka although it has been sorted a little bit sorted but then there would be some kind of you know okay so he she's a she's a muslim girl i am a hindu my religion is you know under attack and i have to behave in a certain way so that's really problematic because earlier there was nothing like

that and coming back to the university where i study so it's a central university it's a like the name only suggests it's a minority, like it's given the status of it. And so there, there is no such prescribed uniform code. There you can, and also if there is any, like even if I cover, that should be matching the color of my uniform. There is no choice that you can go and wear whichever color you want.

So I don't think there is any problem with that. Well, it's very good to get an insight from you, Sumaya, about those realities. Divya and Sumaya, thank you both for your time. More from Divya on this story over at BBC News Online. Her article, Karnataka Hijab Controversy, How It Is Polarising Its Classrooms, is up on our World pages, ready to read there. Now, let me introduce you to Isabel F Farah who is a British-Lebanese actor, comedian and writer and following an undergraduate degree in French and film studies

she trained as a classical actress. She started doing stand-up comedy in 2017 and has since gigged across the UK and internationally. Her one-woman comedy show, Ellipsis, about grief, authenticity and punchlines, enjoyed a sellout run at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival last summer and is currently on at the Pleasance Theatre in London. She joins me now to talk about her show. Thank you for joining us, Isabel. It is billed as this one-woman show about grief, authenticity and punchlines. I am intrigued. Tell us more about how this show came to be um I so I started writing it in mid 2018 my cousin died at the beginning of 2017 and I started writing it about 18 months later and I was sort of wanted to look at um so kind of like masking so I'm really aware that when I'm on stage I have to you know for when I'm doing a play or if I'm

doing comedy anything that's happening in the background, like anything that's happened in my day or kind of has to just kind of go into like the back of my head because I have to focus on the performance. And I think then I realised that through the grief, like that I was feeling after Jen died, I really felt like I was having to do that day to day as well. And so just turn up into my day job and just, you know, just function without really showing that I was actually really,

really struggling. And so what I wanted to do was show that in like really, really starkly in my own show. So it's sort of a comedy show. And at times I pick up the mic and the lights change a little bit. So it feels like you're in my own show. So it's sort of a comedy show. And at times I pick up the mic and the lights change a little bit. So it feels like you're in a comedy club. And then I just do these really, really tight punchlines, really smooth talking, you know, absolutely rehearsed to a T and I know where the laughs sit and then put the mic back down, the lights change

and it becomes a much more sort of what we call a broad wash. So kind of like daylight lighting. And so you can kind of see, and then I talk about what was going on in the back of my head while I was writing that material. So I really wanted to show like the marked contrast between those two states, partly to show what we do as comics or as performers, but also how we all mask in our day-to-day life a little bit

when we're dealing with mental health issues or grieving. Putting on our bravest faces, and it sounds very intricate what you are describing there. It was inspired, as you said, by the sad death of your cousin in difficult circumstances. Jen, her name was. Tell us about her. So Jen was my, she's my cousin. We were 11 cousins. Her mum is my mum's sister and we were 11 cousins um her mum is my sister my mum's sister um and we were exactly the same age we were born two weeks apart and we were actually due on the same day and I ended up being early and she died between our birthdays um so there was I felt quite strongly like this parallel of our lives like you know having grown up and reached the same life stages and things that

you know leaving school and all of those things to suddenly you know age 31 leave her behind um uh and you know she died by suicide which is another thing that I sort of addressed I don't I don't say it until the very end of the show because I kind of wanted the show to almost be universal as much as possible but I think um the word suicide's a really difficult one to hear it's a difficult one to talk about um and I think the word suicide is a really difficult one to hear. It's a difficult one to talk about. And I think people find it really hard to engage with, with how that happened and like why. And when I told people she died, people were like, oh God, was she ill? And I'd say, well, yeah, but I think they're expecting like cancer or,

you know, a sudden, you know, a car accident or something. But when you say suicide, they're like, oh, and they're not quite sure how to react. And then doing the show has just meant, you know, I've had, I've had people message me through my website or people come up to me afterwards and say, oh, thank you so much for articulating all of that because I don't know how to talk about it. And I really struggled to say stuff and so just you know it's

nice having great reviews it's nice having ticket tickets sold but actually the biggest things have been like people messaging me and saying thank you for for articulating something I've never been able to really speak about yeah and of course um I'm very sorry to hear about Jen and I'm glad that you found your outlet in this way but many will wonder how you can be funny when you're feeling all consumed with sadness because some people can't even bring themselves to eat or turn on the tv for example when their loved one has passed away um well I struggled like and I sort of talk about that on stage like the first I remember going back to gigs and I sort of was just starting I just decided to really push it

and like take a bit less of a focus on my acting career to really like push being a comedian and I um I basically was finding myself talking about all sorts of stuff on stage that was really like less about like the actual feelings in my in my body you know I think you can you can make up funny stories you can you know turn a thing that's happened in your life and like sort of turn it into something that's like a very neat bit of material but I think the best stuff comes from when you really and I say this in my show from when you really push into the depths of your mind and you find like why your mind thinks in a certain way and that becomes relatable to an audience um and so I struggled at the beginning and I remember listening to a podcast and someone said uh someone said you'll write the thing that's at the top of your head, the thing that means the most to you.

And then it will free a whole load of other stuff up underneath. So I just remember thinking, oh, I'm going to have to write a show about this, about the fact that I'm struggling to be funny, which has always been, you know, how I've, how I've functioned in life. So I decided to write this and it was it's I think so I bill it as a kind of theatre comedy hybrid and just so that no one's disappointed if they if they turn up expecting punch lines they're going to get a woman talking about her mental health and it's it might be disappointing or if someone turns up expecting like a play it's not necessarily that either but I wanted um I didn't want to turn it into a pure stand-up show because I didn't think that honored the depth of feeling that I wanted to show in it as well and you can turn all of your mental health stuff into

really tight punch lines and just keep rolling through them and talking about like being on antidepressants or seeing your GP or like loads of people being depressed around you. All of those things you can do. But I didn't want that. I didn't want it to be flippant. I wanted it to be heavy and light at the same time. So I kind of picked that form. And that's quite a delicate balance to strike, but it's clearly been hugely successful. The show is called Ellipsis. Tell us about the name. The name. So I discovered after Jen died, I discovered this thing that basically people who work in suicide prevention or, you know, have a contact with suicide often use an ellipsis to mark the point at which someone has attempted

or contemplated suicide. And that's the point between two related clauses in the sentence. So after the semicolon, you have a new but unrelated clause in the sentence that are related. So new, after the semicolon, you have a new but unrelated clause in the same sentence. So it's a new part of someone's life. And I became obsessed with this and I saw people's tattoos of it. I saw it on necklaces. I saw it on Instagram.

And I kind of thought, well, the point at which Jen died was my semicolon. And I thought, I'm going to get a semicolon tattoo. And then I kept on like sitting in the back of my head and I was like that's not your journey that's not your path that's not who you are and so I was like it's not quite right and then about halfway through 2018 when I started writing the show I realized that the ellipsis in punctuation in academic writing it indicates that something's missing that you've taken a little bit of a sentence and just removed it

but the essence of it is still there um but also if you put it at the end of a sentence, as a performer, if I read that, I'd think that the sentence sort of continues, but silently. So I say this at the end, it's an ellipsis, an indication that something's missing. So she's missing, but it's also a continued thought, sentence, life. That's beautiful. Thank you for showing that. Thank you. In terms of the reception, we know it's also a continued thought sentence life that's beautiful thank you for sharing that thank you um in terms of the reception we know it's been positively received by by those who go to the theatre who go to watch comedy but your family it's a difficult one because with elders especially they they have their their way of dealing with grief and they expect that often um especially

in some communities to be translated down to the younger generations. How did your family receive the show? I mean, so it's my British family. So they've been really supportive. I mean, my uncle's been to every single one. It's been really lovely having them there. And I think, you know, my brother and my sister-in-law and stuff and my parents have just been so many times right from the get-go. I've done, I think I did two or three work in progresses in 2019 and then obviously it's been on a bit in 2020

and then last year at the Southwark Playhouse and then Edinburgh and then at the Soho as well. So, you know, people have just been back and forth and just really, really loved the work and been really supportive of it. Well, we wish you all the best with that. There's a couple of more days to catch Isabel's show on in London until the 19th. And then we await her next show, which is called Irresponsible, which I'm told is pure comedy. So we look forward to hearing more about that.

Thank you so much, Isabel Fara there. We're going to talk about some new research funded by the Home Office now, which has found that a tenth of domestic abuse cases involve parents being attacked by their children. These findings are based on almost 67,000 reports investigated by the Lancashire Police, of which almost 7,200 involved a child over 16 abusing a parent or parental figure. Lots to get through here. Let's speak to Nicola Graham-Kevin, who is a professor of criminal justice psychology at the University of Central Lancashire and led this research. And Kat Wilson, a senior support worker at Women's Aid.

Good to have you both with us. Let me start with you, Nicola. Talk us through the key findings of this report. Yes, so we explored all cases of child to parent domestic abuse and for it to be classified as child to parent domestic abuse the child needs to be 16 years or older and therefore we worked with Lancashire Constabulary and the Lancashire Violence Reduction Unit to access the data and screened and isolated from the 67,000 cases of domestic abuse in time period that over, well, 10.7% of the cases were actually child to parent, which was really interesting and far higher than we expected. We were also interested though to look at the complexity

around these cases because often domestic abuse is sort of spoken in a set sort of typology and we wanted to look at whether there were different types and so we did some psychological contextualization, we did systematic reviews of literature already published. And we found that there's actually different types of child to parent domestic abuse and that these have implications for police responses, potential for serious harm and so forth. Okay.

So some very serious findings there, ones that have clearly surprised you as an expert there. An important point to make that the average age of the perpetrators was 27 years old and the average age of the victim, I understand, was 54 years. Kat, let me bring you in here. How common is it for parents, women in particular,

to contact women's aid in situations like this? It is very common. In reality, I think there's probably a lot more women out there who are experiencing this type of abuse who don't reach out and seek help um but as a national service we do hear about it quite a lot um it is quite common all all different types of abuse whether that's sort of that initial um emotional abuse or you know, we do hear of more serious cases of physical assault and threats to kill. Yeah, we hear of all sorts and it is extremely common. And as someone on the front line listening to these people calling you up, sharing their experiences with you,

are you surprised by seeing those numbers on paper? You say it's common, but when you see those stats on paper, do they shock you in any way? I mean, yes and no. I think probably no, because I do know how common it is. But yes, in a sense, I'm surprised there's so many people that have spoken out about it. Just because there's a huge, huge barrier, I think, in reporting domestic abuse in general. You know, we know, we hear of perpetrators, you know, not taking responsibility, blaming the other person. There's that whole sense of guilt and shame around experiencing domestic abuse but I think so much more so if you're that person's mum if you're that parent you know they might feel more shame they might feel like they failed as a parent they might feel responsible you know we know the excuses that perpetrators use of I've got mental health issues or I'm going to kill myself because of you.

So I think for parents experiencing that, they really carry a lot more of that responsibility. So that adds another layer to that sort of nuance in that relationship. So I do think it's probably more difficult for women to speak out about that type of abuse. You talk about some of the excuses that are used by parents. You mentioned mental health, but in many cases, I imagine mental health has played a key role. Nicola, what are the key reasons that you found behind these figures? Well, just before we jump into that, I'd like to just go back and say it's not just mums, it's dads as well.

So our research found about a third of the victims were men, and men we know are less likely to report domestic abuse. And the systematic review suggests that men and women are equally likely to be targeted by their children. So I just wanted to make that clear. That's a very important point, yes. Yeah, and when you look at the self-reported literature, boys and girls, men and women are equally likely to be aggressive.

It's just that men are more likely to be possibly drawn into the criminal justice system. In terms of reasons for it, actually, the ones with the most potential for harm are actually the ones with the most mental health issues, you know, as specified by the parent parental figure so it isn't that these are excuses these are actual you know pressures within families where you've got children who have mental health problems and as we've all seen within services and only likely to get worse as time goes on as services to support people with mental health decline then families are left longer and longer to actually try and manage that within the family home so mental health is a massive part of this other factors include children who have previously been victimized themselves so they've appeared in

police data as a victim of domestic abuse possibly child to parent um there's also pressures around people staying at home longer no one can afford to leave home now so parents and children are coexisting in a house for longer periods of time together and that's going to always cause pressures and more so during the pandemic in uh in recent years and let's talk about the pandemic, because this research was conducted from November 2018 to February 2021. And we know that when it comes to domestic abuse, largely considered to be between a couple, the Crime Survey for England and Wales found a 7% growth in police-recorded domestic abuse crimes. Kat, to what extent do you think the pandemic would have exacerbated abuse cases at the hands of children? And have you noticed an increase in the number of calls during this period?

Yeah, it did. It really did increase dramatically for us. I think in the first two weeks of lockdown, we saw a 41% rise of women reaching out to us for support. So I think it's that extra added pressure of not being able to leave the house. And perpetrators really use that as a threat as well. You know, if you try and make me leave, then I'm going to call the police on you, those types of threats.

So that added an extra layer to that abuse. And also not having sort of safe spaces to go. So maybe young children in the house, you know, they couldn't access schools, mothers and parents not being able to go to work and sort of leave that pressure environment. Yeah, so it definitely added that extra layer and also then not being able to have resources to seek support from. So, you know, maybe it's not safe for them to be making calls just because they're going to be overheard by the perpetrator.

Yeah, a very important point. To both of you here, I mean, it must be very difficult to report your own children to the police. And I'm assuming, therefore, that the figures we are looking at here may well be an underestimation of the real number of these cases that might be unfolding. Nicola Furst and Kat, please feel free to pick up. Yes, certainly. I mean, we looked at some of the case information and we're actually following up this project longitudinally. So hopefully we'll come back in a few months and talk about our findings. But we found that many of the parents did not want a criminal justice response.

They wanted support. They wanted their child to access support support they wanted support as a family so um what i think would be really fantastic is if if we could have a probably more consultation with people who do experience aggression from their children to really understand what they want because it would be awful if that people can't access support because they're concerned about criminal justice outcomes and it would be nice to see more victim sort of input into what solutions should be offered um for them and i think that would really encourage maybe earlier um contact with the police yeah kat yeah exactly what nicola said really I think so many survivors are afraid to speak out because they don't want to see their children get into trouble. They, you know, and also they don't want to escalate the situation

if they're unsure about what the outcome might be. So, yeah, I think definitely we need to be survivor-led. And I think on top of that, I just think maybe more awareness around these dynamics of abuse. And I know, like, obviously, we've said mental health, it can impact, of course it can. And things like substance misuse, you know, these are all absolute risk factors. But also, it's not an excuse. You know, there are plenty of people who've grown up in abusive households who aren't

abusive themselves you know I think just having that understanding can then really help women and all survivors just come forward and be able to speak out about what they're experiencing without you know it just shifts some of that blame away from from the survivor and you know the perpetrators really are responsible for their own actions. Very difficult and complex issue to be talking about. Thank you so much, Nicola Graham-Kevin and Kat Wilson there from Women's Aid.

If you do need support or advice on any of the issues we've discussed in this segment with Kat and Nicola, please do go to our website. The National Helpline link is there. And now to the Winter Olympics. And just this morning morning we've heard that the Great Britain women curlers team have just got into the semi-final and sportswoman Zoe Atkins has qualified for the women's free ski halfpipe final in fourth place so some good news at last

let's get an update now from Katie Smith BBC Sports and Five Live journalist thanks for joining us Katie how significant is the news of the curlers team here? And Zoe, of course. Well, when you consider that we have absolutely no medals to talk about for Team GB, you would say incredibly significant because we only have three days of action left. We were potentially looking at the first time in 30 years since Great Britain left the Winter Olympics with no medal. But now some real, real prospects. Zoe, as you said, qualified in fourth place. She is actually a current bronze world medalist as well. She's won a World Cup event and she's got the perfect

role model in the shape of her sister, Izzy Atkin, a little bit older than her. She's had to pull out of the Beijing Games with a fractured pelvis, but four years ago, she got a bronze medal for Team GB, also in freestyle skiing. That was the first ever British skiing medal at the Winter Olympics. And Zoe Atkins, she's only 19. She's a real exciting prospect. So I think real genuine enthusiasm around what she might be able to do.

And then the curling team, I think the real significance of them is just how very, very very very close it was for them to not make the semi-finals they earlier had to beat the Russian Olympic Committee and rely on other results it all went their way and now they play Sweden in the semi-finals tomorrow and we know what knockout competition means it's a blank slate sorry that means you know anything can happen and Eve Muirhead who's leading that team, she has a bronze medal. She has a silver medal in the bag from past games. She just needs one to add to the collection. And you think momentum might help. So the boost in morale that the country needs. I'm hearing some beautiful music there in the background. I'm assuming that's to

do with the figure skating, but it sounds wonderful. Very soothing, very calming, Katie. Exactly what we need. Exactly. We've got Alexia Paganini of Switzerland on the ice at the moment. She's the seventh skater to take to the ice. This is the free skating. So this is the second part of the women's figure skating program. But really the entire competition has been overshadowed by the 15-year-old child prodigy she was called before these games, Kamila Valieva of the Russian Olympic Committee, testing positive for a banned substance halfway

through these games. Now, she is due to compete later on around 1.50. We expect her on the ice, but a huge asterisk next to her name because she's tested positive for a banned substance. The IOC wanted her to not compete, but the Court of Arbitration for Sport have allowed her to take to the ice. They said it would cause irreparable damage to a 15-year-old if she couldn't have that moment. And what it means basically is that if she medals and she is currently ranked first in the competition, she's the favourite, there would be no medal ceremony, there would be no medals handed out. And of course, that's caused huge consternation amongst other teams as well.

And of course, lots of other players, lots of other athletes very concerned about the outcome for her. And in some cases, what some people are calling double standards at play. Absolutely. We've had a lot of coaches coming out saying this is just, you know, unacceptable for these athletes, many athletes devoting their lives to the Olympic Games, potentially stripped of a moment on the podium because of this case. Travis Tygart, he's the chief anti-doping officer in the USA, says this poses a lot of red flags because we've also had news today that she's tested positive for three heart condition treatment drugs, one of those being a banned substance, two of them not banned. But really that shows, you know, a lot of red flags, he says,

because they're all used for increasing performance. And he says this is a catastrophic failure from the Olympics to allow this to be the case and allow her to compete. Well, we'll see what the outcome of that is later on in the afternoon. Plenty more over at Sports Online on the BBC website. But that is it from Women's Hour for now. Thank you for spending part of your morning with us. We are, of course, back again with you tomorrow.

Thanks for listening. There's plenty more from Women's Hour over at BBC Sounds. Hello there. This is Marian Keyes. And I'm Tara Flynn. And together we present a brand new podcast for BBC Radio 4 called Now You're Asking. In each episode we make your problems our problems. Try to make molehills from your mountains. We read your emails, listen to your woes and do our best to help.

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Grant. So join us for love, laughs, lies, life and death. Search up Now You're Asking on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody. Every doula that I know.

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