SHOULD YOUNG SIKHS WEAR THE KIRPAN IN LEICESTER SCHOOLS?

Meeting at the Tigers, early evening, to discuss the Sikh text in the series currently under development, "Engaging with Leicester's Faith Communities". Representatives of all Leicester's gurdwaras have been invited, Head Teachers (or Deputy Heads) of the six primary schools and four secondary schools with the biggest numbers of Sikh pupils in the city and a small number of others identified as stakeholders.

More specifically, the major topic for discussion is the wearing of the kirpan (one type of which is illustrated in the photo above) in Leicester schools and colleges. The steering group (of which I am a member) have gathered advice and information from other local authorities (e.g. Bedford, Birmingham, Redbridge) who have gone through a similar process. We want our text to contain intelligent and definitive guidelines that can be followed in the city. There's an hour-and-a-half of mature, trusting and friendly consultation among around 25 of us and I believe everyone went away happy. One good result was that more people wanted to have a read of the whole text before it is approved for publication. More work for those of us involved in writing and editing it, but it definitely brings a better sense of engagement all round - and that, in itself, is one of the intended results of creating this series of texts.

I'm not going to try and present the content of our discussion here. That would not do justice to the topic or to the quality of contributions that were made round the table. I count myself privileged to be involved in this kind of work with such people.