By Chirag Patel,
NHSF (UK) Vice President
Click here to see our letter to Eric Pickles MP
Click here to see our Press Release
National Hindu Students’ Forum (UK) (NHSF) has supported Sewa Day since its foundations were laid in 2010, we would like to extend this support and to fully endorse their move to step away from the Government initiative to celebrate Her Majesty’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations, A Year of Service (AYOS), due to concerns about the financial governance of the initiative.
Although young Hindu students will not be able to take part in AYOS, as part of such a historical celebration, we recognise the need to take such steps. The Hindu community in particular have lacked support from the Government and in particular with finance related matters with regards to AYOS and otherwise.
The sum of £65,000 was awarded to AYOS’ lead member and despite repeated requests by Sewa Day for clarity on the application and funding of this grant, no answers or accountability have been provided. What makes this lack of accountability of such a huge amount of money more worrying is the state of our economy and cut backs being faced.
Arup Ganguly, Sewa Day Chairman, has said “We’ve asked questions and have been told that we will not receive any detailed answers.” We join Sewa Days irritation at the poor response given by the Government and are requesting them to provide answers to the following questions posed by Sewa Day in March:
·Who is in control of applying the funds?
·What is the rough breakdown of the intended fund application? Is there a budget projection for AYOS?
·Can AYOS Group members apply for any of the funds towards their own reasonable AYOS related expenses? (So far, no funding has been offered to group members)
·What will be done with residual funds once AYOS is complete?
In addition to the questions posed by Sewa Day, NHSF has written to Eric Pickles MP about these matters and to ask the Government to be more considerate to the needs of the Hindu community. We have also inquired about any funding which has been made available for Hindu initiatives (as we are not aware of any) as well as the rationality behind allocating such a large sum of money to one organisation considering the cuts being faced by other organisations, and in particular – charities.
The Integrity of equality and accountability are two things the coalition government claim to have stood for, yet the Conservatives and Liberal Democrat parties appear to have made an exception this time, at the cost of Hindus across the country.