Right from the first hours when the results of Iran’s national university entrance examinations were announced last July, most Bahai applicants were dismayed to see the label “Incomplete Application” on their papers after they had registered their personal information on the online application form.
At this moment, there is still no accurate, complete and official information about the number of Bahai applicants who have met this condition. With the leaders of Iran’s Bahai community behind bars (they were arrested and imprisoned as a group a few months ago), it is perhaps not eve possible to gather such data. But in any case, Incomplete Application is a bizarre substitute for a report or score card to be given to a candidate for higher education! This is because if a person’s application lacks essential data, then he or she would not be issued a registration card to even participate in the national entrance exam. In these cases, these applicants had been issued such cards and had taken the test.
Categorizing these applicants with this label makes it impossible for them to pursue their cases at the national courts of law or even foreign courts because they cannot prove what the missing or wrong documents are.
Similar situations had been announced last year for Bahai applicants and the extensive follow up of those cases had not produced any results. So it appears that this year too, a similar outcome my await the current rejectees, which means that many potential talents and students will be deprived of higher education, a basic personal right.
The constitution of the Islamic republic of Iran has provisions that make the government responsible for providing free education to every person in the country up to high school, while also facilitating free higher education. But since the 1979 revolution, we have witnessed the expulsion of almost all Bahai students from Iranian universities because of their religious beliefs, while other Bahais were denied admission to any domestic university. But as of four years ago, when apparently Bahai’s have been allowed to enter Iranian universities, many are deprived of continuing their education on different grounds such as incomplete applications. Others that manage to get in have been expelled for being a Bahai.
This summer, in addition to receiving this kind of treatment over their educational aspirations, Iranian Bahais have faced other serious pressures. The leaders of Iran’s Bahai community Mahvash Sabet, Fariba Kamalabadi, Afif Naimi, Saeed Rezayi, Vahid Tizfahm, Jamaledin Khanjani and Behrouz Tavakoli are still all in prison. It is reported that they are in the notorious solitary cells of ward 209 of Evin prison which is under the exclusive control of the state security apparatus, unreachable by the judiciary or others. On June 20, 2008 they were given for the first time the permission to contact their family members for a short period of time. In recent days, they were again given time to contact their family members. Still, Behrouz Tavakoli is the only one among the group who has till today not succeeded in contacting his family members.
According to reports, the detention period of the Bahai leaders has been extended as they continue to stay in solitary confinement cells. This despite that Jamaledin Khanjani and Behrouz Tavakoli have serious metabolism and skin health problems.
It is noteworthy that dissident cleric, and one time the number two man in the Islamic republic’s political hierarchy, ayatollah Montazeri has spoken publicly about the citizenship rights of the Bahais. He categorically stated, “Even though Bahais do not form the official religion of Iran, they must enjoy rights enjoyed by all citizens.”
Acceptance or rejection of the Bahai beliefs, like in other religions, requires study and analysis. The question that comes to mind is that while the Islamic regime has such an unchallenged position in the country from the religious perspective (an interpretation of Islam based on the rule of the clerics, i.e. Velayate Faghih), and its freedom in propagating this across the country, why is it so fearful of any contacts with other religions, not just Bahaism. Is it not true that every Muslim must have the freedom to raise his questions of others, just as the followers of other religions too must have the autonomy to talk and explain their beliefs? This is the issue of the freedom of expression of Bahais in Islamic societies.
