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Sarika's Kara
issue is now before High Court
WSN
Network
CARDIFF: The case of
Sarika Singh, the 14-year-old Sikh girl excluded from her Aberdare
Girls' School in the Welsh town of Aberdare for wearing integral
Sikh symbol of Kara, will be heard in the High Court.
Sarika has not
attended school since being told she cannot wear her bracelet, the
kara. She refused to remove it and claimed it cannot be treated as
jewelry. The school's uniform policy prohibits any jewelry other
than a wristwatch and plain ear studs. Sarika is of Welsh-Indian
origin and her full name is Sarika Watkins-Singh.
Liberty, the human
rights group which has filed the challenge, claimed the school has
breached race relations and human rights laws, and has now won the
right to put the matter before the High Court. The case is not
expected to be heard for several months.
 One argument is also
that there is a 25-year-old Law Lords' decision which allows Sikh
children to wear items representing their faith — including turbans
— to school.
An interim hearing
will be held in the next two weeks to decide whether Sarika, the
only Sikh at her school, can return to classroom while the case is
continuing.
Liberty claims
Aberdare Girls' School is violating the Race Relations Act 1976, the
Equality Act 2006 and the Human Rights Act 1998. The group is asking
for the school to amend its uniform policy to comply with Britain's
Race Relations Act.
As the WSN had
underlined earlier also, the question of what students may or may
not wear to school has become a complex one. In French state schools
girls are not allowed to wear the hijab — but in Britain they are,
though the line is drawn at burqas (though this is permitted in
private Muslim schools). Some schools do not allow their girls to
wear the crucifix, arguing it is not compulsory for Christians.
The issue, instead of
being seen as a localised matter of school discipline, has now
become a major international affair as Sikhs everywhere are being
joined by the human rights activists to overturn the ban. On January
15, some 4,000 Canadian Sikhs came together in support of Sarkia
Singh at a protest demonstration on the steps of the Welsh Assembly
in Cardiff.
30 January 2008
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