Iran: The Status of Women

Before 1979, Iranian women were no different from their European counterparts at least in terms of lifestyle. They went dancing, attended parties, wore ‘western’ outfits and were as 'modern' as they come. But all this changed in 1979, with the establishment of the Islamic Republic, women who were doctors, judges and diplomats etc. found themselves without a job as they were considered too ‘emotional’. There were twenty-two women in Parliament before 1979, now reduced to just a few members.  

In the newly formed Islamic Republic, women were restricted to their homes, barred from practising their profession and were told to adhere to a strict dress code when out in public.

The veil has often been seen as the symbol of suppression in Islamic countries, Turkey is considered quite modern as it has banned the veil and hejab in public places, and likewise Saudi Arabia and Iran are considered ‘conservative’ as they have laws that make the Chadors and Hejab compulsory.  But it’s important to note that wearing of the veil was not based on interpretation of religion but social class. Before the coming of Islam in the seventh century, it was only the upper-class women in Byzantine Empire that wore the veil as a mark of their high status. Even today, the veil is wore differently in different cultures, some cover the whole face, some cover the face partly or some not at all. The Koran very clearly lays out that men and women are considered equal in the eyes of God. The Prophet himself was married to a trader, a warrior, a leatherworker and an imam. He made female infanticide which was quite common at the time unlawful, he made the education of girls a sacred duty and gave them the right to own and inherit property. A religion that called for equality has been twisted and is now used as the reason to establish inequality.

The women’s rights movement in Iran began at the turn of the 20^th century. Reza Shah Pahlavi for all his despotism was a man that pushed - albeit with force - for modernism in Iran.  Under his rule (1925 onwards) Women’s movement was given a new lease of life, he started many State run secondary schools and vocational schools for girls, he also gave access to Women to attend Tehran University.  In 1936, he passed a policy called kashf-i-hejab which required women to unveil, women with veils were not allowed on buses or baths, shops were not allowed to sell veils to women and women found wearing veils were beaten up.

This ‘openness’ continued into the rule of his successor, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, under his rule the Parliament passed the Family Protection Law (FPL) in 1967. The law gave women decent rights in marriage, divorce and child custody. Amendments were made to FPL in 1975 allowing women to become judges and represent clients in court.

But soon enough the things that made them modern, became symbols of ‘western’ powers and imperialist culture, along with being representative of the repressive regime of the Shah and in a way this belief served as a platform for the comeback of the Veil and Chadors.

And so when the clerics came to power, they rolled back all the progress that was made in Iran towards growing freedom for women. On 26^th February, 1979, Ayatollah Khomeini suspended the FPL calling it ‘un-islamic’, he also reverted back the marriageable age for women to nine (it had become 18 under FPL). Women could also no longer initiate divorce proceedings, they were not allowed to serve in the army, and women could work outside their homes but had to wear the hejab to work. Many Iranians responded at the time with protests and sit-ins, but they were often attacked and beaten by conservative men and women. By 1983, the Majlis (Iranian Parliament) passed a law that any women caught without a hejab would be charged on a criminal offence and punished with seventy-four lashes.

Under Mohammad Khatami, the President of Iran from 1997 to 2005, things started to take a turn for the better, he supported many women rights and NGOs, many new laws were implemented like relaxation in hejab rules, and marriage age for girls was raised from nine to fifteen although later it was again reduced to thirteen.  The limitations of the President to do anything came from branches of the regime that was still dominated by radical conservatives; it’s no secret that the president is more or less a figurehead, as the real power lies with the supreme leader.

But the little progress that was made under Khatami met a dead end called Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who became the President of Iran in 2005, he restricted women’s freedom pertaining to employment, increased the strictness relating to dress code and most importantly his government introduced the Family Protection Act, which reduced the rights that women had fought for over the years under family law, the women’s rights movement gave it the name of anti-family law as under the law, polygamy and temporary marriages became easier for men, getting a divorce became a process much worse than getting a passport in India and it also, criminalized the marriage of non-Iranian to an Iranian woman without proper authorization. Although, after many requests and protests by women’s rights activists, the parliament committee did put on hold some controversial parts of the bill.

The regime during this time also shut down many women’s magazines and websites like, Zanestan and in 2008, it shut down what was considered the most important women’s magazines for sixteen years – Zanan.

There has been progress; I can call it progress when compared to Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan and Iraq. But nevertheless, women in comparison to men are treated as second class citizens by the constitution and the government. Women have to wear the hejab in public, regardless of any religion. The men may have up to four permanent wives and infinite temporary wives. In the case of divorce, mothers have custody of their children only till they are the age of seven after which the father gets automatic custody. Women who get convicted of adultery are stoned to death, whereas men, enjoy complete immunity from punishment and if they murder their adulterous wives and their lovers even then they are liable to walk free.

Defiance is the only thing that separates the Iranian women from women in many Islamic countries in the region that are what we can call ‘conservative’. They find creative ways of pushing back the boundaries of dress code, if they wear headscarves, they are often transparent, and since only eyes are often visible, it will be hard to find anyone in the world having as beautiful eye makeup than Iranian women. They drive cars, make documentaries, and run their own businesses. Today, women in Iran make up 70% of University intake, although they often do not translate into jobs as they make up only 25% of the work force, but even still it’s an improvement to what their situation was in the early years of the Islamic Republic.