Britain's first state-funded Hindu faith school has recently become involved in a major row. This row involves the man who is scheduled to become the spiritual head of the school's affairs when it opens in 2008.

Two campaign groups, Hindu Human Rights and Vivekananda Centre, are concerned about the involvement in the school's affairs of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON).

This organisation is to become an affiliated faith partner of the school. According to the Eastern Eye newspaper, there are worries that the president of Bhaktivedanta Manor temple in Watford, to the north of London, in Watford, hit children when he was teaching at an ashram in India. The president, Gauri Dasa, is a member of ISKCON.

As Arjun Malik, spokesman for Hindu Human Rights, said to the paper: "We have received emails for a while now, expressing concerns about allegations that Gauri Dasa used to beat children. Parents will obviously not feel safe sending their children to a school which has such a man involved".

In answer to this, Gauri Dasa has stated that corporal punishment was part of the disciplinary structure of ISKCON schools in the '70s and '80s and has claimed that: "All these allegations stem from an anonymous email sent out to some website. Its contents are full of half-truths...We run a very successful school as part of the Bhaktivedanta temple."

But the information, regardless of whether or not it is anonymous, is believed by many, including one Gurukuli Dasa - it is assumed no relation to Gauri - and a former member of ISKCON's Vrindavan ashram in India. He has said in an article on the web that: "Ashram teacher Gauri Dasa used to beat the kids with slaps and sticks".

But, as Jay Dilip Lhakani, who is the co-ordinator of Vivekananda Centre, an academic body that promotes Hindu studies in schools in Britain, pointed out: "None of the allegations against Gauri Dasa have been proven, but ISKCON has a poor reputation due to the child-abuse lawsuits filed against it in the US".

And Ramesh Kallidai, secretary-general of the Hindu Forum of Britain, has, in effect, defended Gauri Dasa by saying that: "Gauri Dasa is our spiritual ambassador. We are yet to see any hard evidence against him. We are glad ISKCON is associated with the first faith school".

Mr. Kallidai, incidentally, is an initiated member of ISKCON.

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