[custom_adv] The Pahlavi period saw the development of a modern nation-state, rapid urbanization and population growth, establishment of a modern system of national education, and a stronger state-directed economic policy. These all had some repercussions in the province of Isfahan, but most of all in the city itself. [custom_adv] The Reza Shah period, 1925-41. This period, as pertains to Isfahan, consists of two distinct phases: the consolidation of central authority in the 1920s, and social and economic development in the 1930s. [custom_adv] In the process of consolidating his power in Isfahan, Reza Shah managed to constrain two powerful social groups: the Shiʿite clergy and the Baḵtiāri tribesmen; in both cases he adopted the same tactics: an initial stage of compromise and then, when the central authority had established its control, the adoption of much harsher measures. [custom_adv] It was hardly surprising that the local clergy, who had played a leading role in the socio-political life of Isfahan in the decades prior to the establishment of the Pahlavi dynasty (Najafi, passim; Owrang; Anṣāri, pp. 41-51), were vociferously opposed to the social reforms introduced by Reza Shah in the early part of his reign. [custom_adv] The conscription law of 1925 resulted in a general strike in the bazaar of Isfahan, and dozens of mullahs led by Ḥājji Āqā Nur-Allāh Fešāraki, Āqā Najafi, and Sayyed-al-ʿErāqayn set out for Qom to express their protest (December 1927). [custom_adv] The dispute was finally settled by the government’s concession of a short-term draft relief for the mullahs (Najafi, p. 233; M. Hedāyat, p. 479; Makki, 1980, p. 767; Sayfpur, pp. 640-45). [custom_adv] Likewise, the implementation of the uniform dress code from 1928 meant deculturation in a city where not only the clergy but also the members of some guilds wore the turban and the gown, thus giving Isfahan a more palpable aura of religiosity than other Persian urban centers. [custom_adv] Another vexatious measure, the 1936 law that prohibited women from wearing the veil, meant that many women avoided appearing in public until they were at liberty to use the veil again after the end of Reza Shah’s reign. [custom_adv] In the latter years of Reza Shah the reform-minded residents of Isfahan would even dare organize annual carnivals to compensate for the excessive mourning rites of Moḥarram that had been banned nationwide . [custom_adv] The chief advocates for the reform policies of the central government were local newspapers such as Ṣedā-ye Eṣfahān, Aḵgar, Mokrem, and Ḡorreš . [custom_adv] The traditional madrasa students lost their income from established religious endowments when the revenue from these began to be officially earmarked by the state for restoring historical monuments. [custom_adv] The secularization of the judiciary system and the legal and registry offices , which documented transactions, contracts, marriages, and divorces , deprived the clergy of part of its financial revenue. [custom_adv] To undermine further the influential role of the leading madrasas such as Nimāvard and Kāsagarān, in 1927 a new high school of religious sciences was established in the Safavid madrasa of Mādar-e Šāh. [custom_adv] From the Coup d’état of 1953to the 1963 White Revolution. This period saw the continuation of activities by a number of women’s welfare organizations and professional associations and magazines. [custom_adv] Also active were some new organizations, including the New Path Society (Jamʿīyat-e rāh-e now) founded in 1955 by Mehrangīz Dawlatšāhī who, later in the mid-1970s, became the first ever female Persian ambassador. [custom_adv] The Society’s main contribution was its active participation in the drafting of the Family Protection Law of 1967 as well as in providing some welfare and educational services for women in low income groups. [custom_adv] The presence of the Tudeh party and the tribes brought together the rest of the competing forces that were under the umbrella of the Royal National Union Party (Hesb-e waḥdat-e melli) and Sayyed Żiā's Fatherland Party (Hesb-e erada- ye melli) The power distribution was reflected in the electorate's choice of the three Majles members from Isfahan: [custom_adv] Taqi Fadākār, the only one of the eight Tudeh members of the 14th parliamentary session who was not from the Soviet-backed north; Sayyed Hasham al-Din Dawlatabadi, son of a prominent religious leader, supported by the elders of the guilds and bazaar merchants (especially those who had acquired the part of the land confiscated from Batiki khans during Reza Shah's rule) and the National Union party ; and Ḥaydar-Ali Amami, a wealthy merchant and industrialist, backed by Prince Akbar Mas'ud and the Fatherland party. [custom_adv] Additionally, Faraj-Allāh Meṣbāḥ Sayfpur Fāṭemi, with his family newspaper Baḵtar, won the Najafābād seat with the help of the Bačtiāris; and the elections of Shahr's regime and Dezful were won respectively by Aḥmadqoli Khan, son of Mortaţāqoli Khan Baqtiari and his cousin Moḥammad-Taqi Khan As'ad, who spent ten years in prison. [custom_adv] Moḥtaram Eskandarī , the founder of the Patriotic Women’s League in 1922 was the main force behind women’s rights activists. The League purported to honor Islam and its laws. It also organized a consciousness-raising play, “The Apple and Adam and Eve in Paradise” , with active support from spouses of such prominent and enlightened notables as Woṯūq-al-Dawla, Yaḥyā Dawlatābādī , and Adīb-al-Salṭana Sardārī. [custom_adv] tomorrow.” Two days later, after a rumor disseminated by the clerics insinuating that unveiled women were to congregate at the performance, a mob looted the house of Nūr-al-Hodā Mangana where the play was to take place .