Victory for Aberdare Sikh Excluded from School
July 29, 2008
The human rights group Liberty, representing 14-year-old Sarika Singh, successfully argued that Aberdare Girls’ School breached race relations and equality laws by excluding her since November 2007 for wearing the kara (a plain single bangle widely accepted as a central tenet of the Sikh race and religion).
Sarika Singh, of mixed Welsh/Punjabi origin, has been raised in the Sikh faith and was the only Sikh at the Aberdare Girls’ School. The school’s uniform policy prohibits the wearing of any jewellery other than a wrist watch and plain ear studs. When the school noticed that Singh was wearing the kara, she was isolated for two months, including during meals and physical education classes despite her offer to remove or cover the Kara during exercise, before being excluded entirely in November 2007.
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