Iranian authorities have arrested 27-year-old female singer Parastoo Ahmady following her virtual concert on YouTube, where she performed without wearing a hijab. The concert, which was streamed online on Thursday, quickly gained attention, amassing over 1.4 million views. Ahmady performed in a long, black sleeveless dress alongside four male musicians.
Ahmady was reportedly detained in Sari City of Mazandaran province on Saturday. Iranian lawyer Milad Panahipour said, referring to Ahmady, that her whereabouts remain unclear, nor have her charges been defined clearly, yet. Panahipour noted that Soheil Faghih Nasiri and Ehsan Beiraghdar, two band members of Ahmady’s, were taken from the same city, Tehran, on Saturday as well.
The arrest comes after an investigation initiated by the judiciary yesterday regarding the content of the concert. In the YouTube video, Ahmady said her performance was in fact a declaration of her love for her country and how much she loves singing. “I am Parastoo, a girl who wants to sing for the people I love. This is a right I could not ignore,” she said in the post accompanying the concert.
Ahmady’s performance is significant as Iranian women have been restricted from public performances for a long time. Since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, women in Iran are banned from singing solo in front of mixed-gender audiences, and their performances are strictly controlled. Although they are allowed to sing for women-only audiences, singing without a hijab in front of men is strictly prohibited according to Islamic law.
The case also sheds light on broader cultural tensions in Iran, where the hijab has been a contentious political symbol. The 2022 protests sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini, who died after being arrested by the morality police for allegedly violating the hijab mandate, brought international attention to the country’s strict dress code enforcement.
The Iranian authorities seem to have changed their stance toward the dress code recently, adopting a softer approach in its implementation. But the arrest of Ahmady and her band members marked a return to a stern crackdown on perceived violations of dress and conduct regulations in the country. The situation continues to change as legal representatives look for clarification on the charges and the whereabouts of those detained.
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