ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has condemned the Indian government for the “reprehensible act” of denying education rights to Muslim women who wear the hijab, summoning the Indian Charge d’ Affaires in Islamabad on Wednesday to convey Pakistan’s “grave concern.”

India’s southern Karnataka state on Tuesday ordered schools and colleges to shut for three days after protests erupted over some institutes refusing entry to students wearing the headscarf. Local media reported last week that several schools in the coastal city of Udupi had denied entry to Muslim girls wearing the hijab citing an education ministry order, prompting protests from parents and students and raising fears among the state’s Muslim students who say they are being deprived of their religious rights.

“Pakistan deplores the reprehensible act of banning Muslim girl students from wearing hijab in the Indian state of Karnataka,” the foreign ministry said in a statement, adding that it had summoned the Indian Charge d’ Affaires.

“The Charge d’ Affaires was urged to convey to the Government of India, Pakistan’s extreme concern over the anti-hijab campaign, … which is part of its [Indian’s government’s] larger exclusionist and majoritarian agenda aimed at dehumanizing and demonizing Muslim women,” the statement said. “Government of India must fulfill its responsibility to hold the perpetrators of harassment against women in Karnataka to account and take adequate measures to ensure safety, security and well-being of Muslim women.”

The government of Karnataka, where 12 percent of the population is Muslim and which is ruled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has said in a recent order that students should follow dress codes set by schools.

Opposition parties and critics accuse the BJP government at federal and state level of discriminating against the minority Muslim population. Modi has defended his record and says his economic and social policies benefit all Indians.

Separately, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan’s adviser on religious harmony, Dr. Tahir Mahmood Ashrafi, announced the government’s decision to mark Friday as ‘Solidarity Day’ with Indian women for standing up to the hijab ban.

The announcement was made a day after videos of an Indian Muslim girl named Muskan went viral on social media, showing her standing her ground against a charged crowd of Hindu students wearing saffron shawls typically worn by Hindus. In the video clip, the mob can be seen heckling and jeering at Muskan before she turns toward them and defiantly shouts “Allahu Akbar.”