A COLOURFUL parade through East Oxford marked one of the most important festivals of the Sikh calendar.
About 200 people joined yesterday’s Vaisakhi procession, which started from St Gregory the Great School, in Cricket Road, and made its way to Cowley Road before returning to the school to complete the celebrations.
It is the third year the city has marked Vaisakhi Day, which is a celebration of the Sikh New Year and also marks 1699, the year Sikhism was born as a collective faith.
Mohammed Altaf-Khan, Oxford city councillor for Headington Hill and Northway, which includes Oxford’s Sikh temple, in Cherwell Drive, said: “It was quite joyful, with a lot of young people and people singing, as well as elderly leaders.
“But the leaders are worried about whether it will happen next year, because they have to close down the temple.”
The temple was refused retrospective planning permission as a place of a worship in January and the congregation has only a few months to find a new home. They have appealed against the decision.
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