THE MOSLEM WORLD: Beyond the Veil

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No Life Without Wife. In India an estimated 50% of some 20 million Moslem women still cling to some form of the veil (sometimes just a bit of cotton draped over the head), but their numbers are dwindling fast. Says slim, bespectacled Mrs. Bilquis Ghuffran, a social worker who discarded her veil two years ago: "Everything will be all right in a generation." Her husband agrees: "Life is not complete if one is to leave one's wife behind in a veil." In Malaya the Sultan of Pahang was ruled out of the running to be the new nation's first Paramount Ruler because of his marital didoes (TIME. Aug. 12), and across the Strait of Malacca, when Indonesia's President Sukarno took a third wife, he touched off vehement, widely publicized feminist demonstrations. In the more cosmopolitan Moslem cities such as Rabat, Cairo, Beirut, Istanbul and Karachi, unveiled women have long since ceased to be a novelty. In Turkey the veil was lifted some 30 years ago under the late great Dictator Kemal Ataturk, and in Iran under the late Reza Shah.

Why Write? Of all emancipation problems, education is the most pressing. Millions of Moslem women are illiterate, and see no need to be otherwise. "Why should my daughter go to school?" demanded one traditionalist Indian mother. "She need not learn to read and write. Her husband will always be by her side. Then to whom should she write a letter?" But such objections are fast yielding to the demand of the young for knowledge, and the determination of the emancipators that they should have it. In Morocco the government has reduced illiteracy an impressive 10% in the two years since independence. In Tunisia's two years as a nation, the number of girls attending schools has increased tenfold. Ten years ago there were only five women's colleges in Pakistan; now there are 25, including medical and law schools. This drive for education has sharply divided generations. Observed one Moroccan educator: "If a girl is 15 and living in the city, chances are she's literate and unveiled; if she's 35, chances are she's veiled and illiterate."

The evolution has not proceeded evenly, and in places like Saudi Arabia and Yemen it has yet to start. King Saud's wives and concubines are transported in air-conditioned Cadillacs with special one-way glass to guard them from prying eyes.

Chains & Max Factor. One of the most striking victories in the emotional tug of war between the past and the future has taken place in Pakistan, which ten years ago was one of the most feudalistic Moslem areas in the world.