According to NGOs, the 16-year-old high school student in Tehran was seriously injured in an “attack” by members of the moral police, who are responsible for enforcing the veil requirement in public. She was in a coma for almost a month.
The case is painfully reminiscent of that of Mahsa Amini, who died just over a year ago after failing to wear her mandatory veil properly. Iranian high school student Armita Garavand, who fell into a coma under controversial circumstances in the Tehran subway in early October, died on Saturday, October 28, local media announced. “Armita Garawand, a student living in Tehran, died an hour ago after intensive medical treatment and 28 days of hospitalization in the special ward,” according to the Borna Agency, affiliated with the Iranian Ministry of Youth and Sports.
The 16-year-old teenager, originally from a Kurdish region, had been under close surveillance in Tehran’s Fajr Hospital since October 1 after he fainted in the capital’s subway. However, the circumstances of this malaise are controversial. Authorities claimed the teenager was the victim of a “heat of tension” and denied any “verbal or physical altercation” between her “and any passengers or subway executives.” On Saturday, the local Tasnim agency cited the “official statement of doctors” that the girl “suffered a fall that resulted in brain damage, followed by persistent convulsions, a decrease in oxygen supply to the brain and cerebral edema after a sudden drop. “Blood pressure.”
“Am I asking you to take off your scarf?”
A version categorically rejected by NGOs is that the high school student was seriously injured in an “attack” by members of the Morality Police, which is responsible for enforcing the veil requirement for Iranian women during audiences. A witness interviewed by British daily The Guardian said that a woman in a chador, who was responsible for enforcing hijab-wearing, argued with the teenager because she was not wearing her headscarf. She then replied, “Am I asking you to take off your scarf? Why are you asking me to wear one?” The agent then allegedly physically attacked Armita Gavarand and then violently pushed her. “Armita Garavand is the latest victim of the forced wearing of the hijab,” responded the Kurdish human rights organization Hengaw, which denounced the pressure exerted on the high school student’s relatives to hide the true causes of her death.
This case comes just over a year after the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian Kurd who died in custody on September 16, 2022, arrested by moral police for allegedly violating Iran’s strict dress codes for women. This death sparked a large protest movement in the country, which left several hundred dead, including police officers, and resulted in the arrest of thousands of people.