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Politics

Did Iran Really Disband The Morality Police?

December 5, 2022
Solmaz Eikdar
5 min read
The Islamic Penal Code says: "Women who appear in the streets and in public without wearing an Islamic hijab shall be sentenced to 10 days to two months’ imprisonment or a fine of 50,500 Rials."
The Islamic Penal Code says: "Women who appear in the streets and in public without wearing an Islamic hijab shall be sentenced to 10 days to two months’ imprisonment or a fine of 50,500 Rials."
Attorney-General Mohammed Jafar Montazeri said on December 3 that “the judiciary continues to monitor behaviors at the community level."
Attorney-General Mohammed Jafar Montazeri said on December 3 that “the judiciary continues to monitor behaviors at the community level."

During a December 3 conference related to the ongoing nationwide protests in Iran, Attorney-General Mohammed Jafar Montazeri was asked: " "Why the morality police were being shut down?"

Montazeri responded: "The morality police has nothing to do with the judiciary, and it was disbanded from the same place it was established in the beginning".

Without mentioning who was supervising the morality police and who had disbanded it, the official said that “the judiciary continues to monitor behaviors at the community level."

Montazeri’s ambiguous remarks were widely reported in domestic and foreign media. So, has the morality police really been disbanded?

A Lie called the "Disbanding the Morality Police"
A Lie called the "Disbanding the Morality Police"

With or without morality police patrols, "mandatory hijab" is the law of the Islamic Republic. Article 638 of the Islamic Penal Code, approved in 1983, says: “Anyone in public places and roads who openly commits a haram (sinful) act, in addition to the punishment provided for the act, shall be sentenced to two months’ imprisonment or up to 74 lashes; if he/she commits an act that is not punishable but harms public modesty, they shall only be sentenced to 10 days to two months’ imprisonment or up to 74 lashes.”

It is also mentioned: "Women who appear in the streets and in public without wearing an Islamic hijab shall be sentenced to 10 days to two months’ imprisonment or a fine of 50,500 Rials."

During the 43 years since the establishment of the Islamic Republic, the enforcers of this law have had various names, from the "committee" to the "moral security police," and the disbanding of these bodies has never led to any legislative change.

Just one day after Montazeri made his vague comments regarding the morality police, the manager of a chain store in Hamedan was summoned for accepting "women with bad hijab", according to the website of Enjoining Good, Prohibiting Vice.

Meanwhile, Tasnim news agency, which is affiliated with the Islamic Republic Guards Corps, reported that a shop in Almas Commercial Complex in Tehranpars was closed by judicial order. According to Tasnim, the reason was the publication of pictures of its staff failing to "respect the religious hijab".

Photo of a shop employee without hijab posted on social media
Photo of a shop employee without hijab posted on social media

And the state Jam-e Jam news website reported on December 4 that in recent weeks an increasing number of travellers had been spotted in airports and flights without a hijab.

The observance of the dress code has been eliminated from some flight in a “coordinated and arbitrary action between some flight attendants and crew”, according to the report.

Without naming the airlines in question, it said: "The stewardesses of the airline (K), with the support of some officials of this company, have removed the reminder of the hijab protocol on flights. Previously, some stewardesses in airline (A) had taken a similar action."

These cases illustrate the government's current approach to women's head coverings.

But regardless of this issue, Al-Alam TV channel, which is affiliated with state-run IRIB, denied the possibility of the morality police being disbanded.

"Some foreign media have tried to interpret the words of the attorney-general as a retreat of the Islamic Republic on the issue of hijab and chastity" it said on December 4, adding: "The maximum impression that can be taken from the words of Hojat ol-Eslam Montazeri is that the morality police have not been under the supervision of the judiciary since its establishment."

Morality Police or Social Security Police

Officials of the Islamic Republic have repeatedly questioned or denied the existence of the morality police. Ensieh Khazali, the vice president for women and family affairs, on July27 said in a Studio Hasht radio show: "We don't have a morality police at all, these are social security police."

These officials are playing on words. In the views of the general public, the force responsible for dealing with women's clothing is known as “morality police”.

Some political or law enforcement figures have used the appellation in their interviews, including Mehdi Hajian, the spokesperson for the Security Forces Command. And searching for the keyword "morality police" in official media will give many results.

The beginning of Morality Police Patrols

The Jondolah patrols began circulating from July 1983, following the criminalization of "bad hijab" or "non-hijab" in the Islamic Penal Code.

However, the issue of women's head coverings first started in offices. Mohammed Mohammadi Ray Shahri, the head of the Revolutionary Court at the time, wrote in a circular on July 1, 1980, that female personnel who did not wear Islamic clothing will be prevented from entering military facilities and transportation services.

A few days later, then-Interior Minister Mohammadreza Mahdavi Kani, Education Minister Mohammad Ali Rajaei and Tehran Mayor Mohammed Tavasoli also announced that female employees must observe the Islamic veil at work. After that, the Revolutionary Council officially announced that women do not have the right to enter government offices without Islamic coverings.

After that, for 14 years, various plans were presented to "deal with bad hijabs".

From the social exclusion of "corrupt people, prostitutes and vices" in July 1983 to the June 1996 announcement of a plan to fight against “bad hijabs” in Tehran by the minister of interior, the agents in charge of implementing these rules were called by different names, ranging from the "committee" to patrols "combating social corruption".

After Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected president, the Chastity and Hijab Plan was approved by the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, and police were using vans marked "Morality Police". The police force was assigned 21 specific duties in relation to women's clothing.

The "morality police patrol" was part a bigger scheme officially named "Social Security Promotion Plan". The patrols returned to the streets with a new name but with the same job description as the Revolution Committee patrols. They stayed in the streets until the beginning of the nationwide protests triggered by the September death of Mahsa Amini in the custody of morality police.

The implementation of this plan was so important for the government and parliament that the police force received a budget of 1,000 billion tomans ($28 million) for the current year. This figure is equivalent to 2.5 times the budget of the country's emergency department, twice the budget of the Center for Intellectual Development of Children and Adolescents, and 1.5 times the budget of the Sharif University of Technology.

The morality police patrol cars have been less visible since the beginning of the current unrest, but on December 4, the "Nazer-1 scheme started working again to report and deal with the unveiling and taking off the hijab in cars", according to the Tour Sina group, which claimed to have an official license from the Enjoining Good, Prohibiting Vice headquarters and the Vice-Chancellor of the Hozeh Propaganda department.

Did Iran Really Disband The Morality Police?

Tour Sina wrote on its official Telegram channel: "According to this scheme, after the license plate is registered in the online system by the supervisor, the owner will be immediately notified by SMS."

Did Iran Really Disband The Morality Police?

In another post, Tour Sina asked users to denounce suspects to the moral security police.

Asked whether the morality police have been dissolved, Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian answered: "Everything is going well in Iran within the framework of democracy and freedom."

The minister's emphasis on law enforcement shows that as long as the "law" in Iran is based on Sharia, hijab will remain mandatory.

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