10-14-2005, 07:48 AM
UK to fund first Hindu school
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LONDON: Britain has officially decreed that its future generations of Indian-origin schoolchildren may substitute Christian prayer with morning mantras, aartis and Vedic ritual, with the announcement that it will pay for the country's first, government-sponsored Hindu school.
News that the school will be established with 10-million pounds of government money and run by the I-Foundation, a religious partner of the persuasive, power-networked and peaceful ISKCON movement, prompted a cheer from much of the UK's estimated 700,000 Hindus.
The British government's nod to Hindu educational aspirations for future generations comes some years after the first state-funded Sikh school opened its doors in west London. Several state-funded Muslim schools are already thriving, alongside at least 30 Jewish state schools and thousands of Anglican establishments.
On Thursday, ordinary British Hindu families in far-flung parts of the British capital admitted they would earnestly endeavour to secure a place for their children at the new Hindu school to "learn Hindu values, to say Hindu prayers and have a Hindu priest to cater to religious needs".
But it is expected to be heavily over-subscribed when the UK's first state-funded Hindu school opens in 2010 in Harrow, west London, which boasts the country's largest concentration of Hindus as a percentage of population.
But Britain's first and only state-funded Hindu school will begin its instruction more than two decades after the Dutch government paid for - and allowed - the establishment of Holland's very own Hindu Modern, an American high school-style secondary school called Shri Vishnu in The Hague.
On Thursday, Ramesh Kallidai, secretary-general of the umbrella Hindu Forum of which the I-Foundation is a part, told TOI, the next step would logically be to have state-funded Hindu schools in other parts of Britain where large Hindu populations lived and worked.
"This is the beginning, not the end," said Kallidai, adding that "Brent, in north-west London has the second-highest concentration of Hindus, after which comes the city of Leicester".
Navin Shah, leader of Harrow Council, which applied for the honour and legitimacy of government funding for a Hindu school to address the local community's needs, said: "The Hindu faith school will be yet another piece in the jigsaw of our culturally diverse and united communities.
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LONDON: Britain has officially decreed that its future generations of Indian-origin schoolchildren may substitute Christian prayer with morning mantras, aartis and Vedic ritual, with the announcement that it will pay for the country's first, government-sponsored Hindu school.
News that the school will be established with 10-million pounds of government money and run by the I-Foundation, a religious partner of the persuasive, power-networked and peaceful ISKCON movement, prompted a cheer from much of the UK's estimated 700,000 Hindus.
The British government's nod to Hindu educational aspirations for future generations comes some years after the first state-funded Sikh school opened its doors in west London. Several state-funded Muslim schools are already thriving, alongside at least 30 Jewish state schools and thousands of Anglican establishments.
On Thursday, ordinary British Hindu families in far-flung parts of the British capital admitted they would earnestly endeavour to secure a place for their children at the new Hindu school to "learn Hindu values, to say Hindu prayers and have a Hindu priest to cater to religious needs".
But it is expected to be heavily over-subscribed when the UK's first state-funded Hindu school opens in 2010 in Harrow, west London, which boasts the country's largest concentration of Hindus as a percentage of population.
But Britain's first and only state-funded Hindu school will begin its instruction more than two decades after the Dutch government paid for - and allowed - the establishment of Holland's very own Hindu Modern, an American high school-style secondary school called Shri Vishnu in The Hague.
On Thursday, Ramesh Kallidai, secretary-general of the umbrella Hindu Forum of which the I-Foundation is a part, told TOI, the next step would logically be to have state-funded Hindu schools in other parts of Britain where large Hindu populations lived and worked.
"This is the beginning, not the end," said Kallidai, adding that "Brent, in north-west London has the second-highest concentration of Hindus, after which comes the city of Leicester".
Navin Shah, leader of Harrow Council, which applied for the honour and legitimacy of government funding for a Hindu school to address the local community's needs, said: "The Hindu faith school will be yet another piece in the jigsaw of our culturally diverse and united communities.
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