Dubai, Sept. 23 (ANI): Saudi Arabian women activists have called for a driving campaign next month to defy the longstanding ban on women driving in the kingdom.
An online petition entitled "October 26, driving for women" was signed by more than 5,800 signatories to push authorities to end the unique ban, the Gulf News reports.
The online petition said "there is not a single text in the Sharia Islamic law that prevents women from driving. Women should be allowed to drive cars as they are the mode of modern age, as horses and camels used to be at the time of the Prophet, unless the authorities want the women to go back to mules and horses."
Activist Nasima Al Sada said some 20 women are going to take part in the driving campaign in kingdom's Eastern Province.
Last time the day of defiance against the ban was on June 17, 2011, when only a few women answered a call to drive, while some were stopped by police and forced to sign a pledge not to drive cars again.
Saudi Arabia also imposes other major restrictions on women, including a requirement to cover from head to toe when in public, the report added.
The move comes after the kingdom's religious police, the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (CPVPV), had been instructed on Friday to stop arresting female drivers. (ANI)
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