Krishna Avanti, a name that will go down in British history as the first Hindu school established through state and private funds to promote high quality education within a framework of Hindu values and ethos.
Background to Education in England
There are some 17, 064 Primary Schools, 3,225 Secondary Schools, 1,058 Special Schools, 2356 Independent Schools and 133 Academies. In total there are around 24, 737 schools of all types in England. Of these, faith schools represent 6,384 Primary Schools and 589 Secondary schools.
Breaking this down further there are 4,716 that are Church of England, 2,108 Roman Catholic, 37 Jewish, seven Muslim, two Sikh, one Greek Orthodox and one Seventh Day Adventist. No Hindu schools.
It was the Labour Party when elected in 1997 that brought in the law which for the first time allowed people of other faiths to also aspire to have their own faith schools. Until then all state faith schools were Christian or Jewish.
The Road to Krishna
The brain child is that of the IFoundation, an organisation set up to establish sustainable projects that further the advancement of Vedic culture and philosophy. In pursuit of their aims, the foundation contributed around £2 million so that if accepted by the Governments’ education department, they could then harness a subsidy of more than £10 million to help build the school. It has also secured the support of its faith partner, ISKCON (UK) which will underpin the Vedic and Hindu values of the school.
