‘…Taj’s case, the Virk Brothers, ‘Southall riots’, virginity tests…’ ‘Virginity tests!’ She exclaimed in horror at the other end of the line. ‘Oh yes,’ I asserted, ‘not just in Islamabad, Dhaka, Delhi, but Heathrow too.’ ‘That’s outrageous. How come we’ve never heard about them?’ This conversation began when a younger member of the family rang […]
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Is England’s Covid Death Toll a Crime Against Humanity?
(This article is solely about England. Excluding Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. All figures are for 6thAugust 2020) A government’s first duty is to protect its people. As fireworks lit up the sky on New Year’s Eve and welcomed in 2020, as gathered crowds across England, cheered and applauded, as people linked arms and […]
Black Lives Matter: A Letter to British-Asians
“I can’t breathe,” has echoed around the world. Millions of people have watched the video, their horror growing with each interminable, never-ending, horrific minute, as Derek Chauvin sits at ease, a knee digging into George Floyd’s neck, a hand causally resting in a trouser pocket, looking for all the world, as if he’s just passing […]
No, I Won’t Be Clapping For Our Carers – And You Shouldn’t Either
First published: Huffington Post. OPINION 30/04/2020 09:42 BST | Updated 01/05/2020 10:23 BST No, I Won’t Be Clapping For Our Carers – And You Shouldn’t Either On Thursday nights, our streets should stay silent, our lights off and our windows dark, author Ravinder Randhawa writes. By Ravinder Randhawa GETTY EDITORIAL I’ve been clapping for the NHS all […]
Privilege is Killing Us
Thousands of people are dying in Britain. In this year of 2020, a pandemic is sweeping across the globe. In some countries the death toll is over thousands, in some it’s hundreds, in a few only in the tens, and in some, such as Vietnam, none reported. A crisis can be revelatory. Cutting through the […]
‘Sikh Soldier Storm’ and The 25th Punjabis
Addition of new material: the historian, Rozina Visram suggested I add copies of the original documents I’d looked at, as they may be of interest to scholars and history geeks. Accordingly, please scroll to the bottom to view 3 galleries. ‘Dear Reader,’ I’ll start with a warning: this is the longest blog I’ve posted. The road to […]
Selling Off The Family Silver
We’re at the end of a year, at the end of a decade; many of us feeling bruised and apprehensive. The UK’s been through four tumultuous years since the 2016 referendum on leaving the European Union, otherwise known as Brexit; it has now elected a right wing government, with a leader whose political advisers, such […]
GE 2019: The Fight of Our Lives
For the first time in my life, I fear for my children and any future grandchildren I may have. For the first time in my life I wonder if it would be best to leave the UK, this ‘sceptered isle,’ that I love. As the daughter of a family who had to flee for their […]