On Wednesday evening, three generations of the Patel family congregated beneath the marble spires of the Shri Swaminarayan Mandir temple in Neasden, northwest London, to celebrate the Hindu new year. In each of the temple’s rooms are golden statues, piles of brightly coloured sweets and candles.
“Being a British Hindu is a source of pride today,” says Shree Patel, 34, bouncing his two-month-old daughter Aashka in a sling. Shree was born in Gujarat and moved to the UK when he was six with his mother, Prit, 54. He also has son, Niyam, two, with his wife, Tejal, 31, who was born in Edmonton.
Worshippers were also celebrating another milestone, the election of Britain’s first Hindu prime minister, Rishi Sunak, who was born in Southampton, helped
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