One woman’s protest against hijab seven years ago lives on

The anti-hijab protests of Vida Movahed seven years ago have become a legacy that haunts the Islamic Republic today as a nationwide movement against the Islamic headscarf continues to blight Tehran's leadership.

Videos and photos of Movahed’s unprecedented act of defiance went viral on social media very quickly, becoming known only as “The Enghelab Avenue Girl” after, having climbed a utility box on Enghelab (Revolution) Ave in Tehran on December 27, 2017, removed her white headscarf, tied it on a stick, and waved it in protest.

The young mother of 32 was arrested within minutes.

Movahed was freed from prison a month later after her first arrest, but her bravery inspired several other young women who came to be known as the 'Enghelab Avenue Girls', protesting on the same spot.

Authorities were eventually forced to build a gable on top of the utility box to stop more girls from climbing it to protest.

Nearly a year later, the young mother climbed a turquoise dome in the center of the very busy Enghelab Square in downtown Tehran with a bunch of red, white, and turquoise balloons and a red and black headscarf in her hand to protest again. She was arrested and was this time sentenced to one year in prison for “inciting people to corruption and immorality” by unveiling.

Movahed served eight months at the notorious Qarchak Prison in the south of Tehran. She has not been seen in public since being freed in 2019 but her name and memory are honored by many every year on social media.

And today, her legacy lives large, thousands of women now appearing unveiled in public arenas, forcing authorities to retreat from implementing a harsh new hijab law drawn up by ultra-hardliners.

The movement was given a rebirth in the wake of the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in the custody of the morality police. It sparked the Woman, Life, Freedom protests across the country in September 2022, protests which lasted for months and saw a tide turn against the compulsory Islamic dress.

During and after the Woman, Life, Freedom protests, scores of celebrities including artists and athletes posted unveiled photos on social media or attended public events with no headscarves. Most of the artists who expressed solidarity with the anti-compulsory hijab movement have been banned from acting, suffering other penalties such as bank account freezes and travel bans.

The public pressure has grown so much in the past year that even Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei appears to have agreed to the shelving of a new and more radical law to enforce hijab, for the fear of inciting unrest if brought into effect.

In a speech in April 2023, Khamenei said that flouting hijab was “religiously and politically haram (forbidden)”, accused foreign intelligence services of encouraging Iranian women to disobey the mandatory head-dress, and urged the authorities to do whatever it took to enforce it.

In his latest speech to a group of women on 17 December, very uncharacteristically, he did not refer whatsoever to the hijab issue and the controversies surrounding it.

Public acts in defiance of the hijab have grown to new heights in recent months despite authorities' threats of severe legal crackdowns, occasional violence against women on the streets, and measures such as impounding vehicles if unveiled women are spotted in them.

There have been a string of now iconic protesters since. In early November, another young woman, Ahu Daryaei, shed her clothes at a university campus in Tehran, reportedly after being harassed by hijab enforcers. She was arrested and sent to a mental health facility but was freed later without charges being brought against her after the story went worldwide.

A few weeks later, Parastoo Ahmadi, a songstress, performed in a historic caravansary in a black evening dress that showed her bare shoulders and streamed her concert live on YouTube. Ahmadi and her band were arrested too but were later released on heavy bail.

Before Movahed’s public act, women’s defiance of hijab had only been done in safe spaces. A campaign was launched by women’s rights activist Masih Alinejad in 2014 on Facebook, My Stealthy Freedom.

Women contributed photos of themselves taken in the car on quiet roads with their hair flowing on their shoulders or in other places where they could “stealthily” remove their headscarves.

But nothing could have predicted the country's biggest rebellion against the mandatory hair covering which has swept the nation, posing the biggest challenge to the government since the Islamic Republic was founded as women from all over Iran continue to rise up.