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Showing posts from February 11, 2010


Hindu Wins Traditional Funeral Pyre Legal Battle In England

A devout Hindu, Davender Ghai, aged 71, had asked for an open-air cremation when he dies but it was denied by Newcastle city council in Britain . Davender Ghai had argued then that denying him an open-air ritual ‘will enslave his soul in endless earthly entrapment.’ This legal debate in England had taken place in March 2009. Now through an appeal in Court of Appeal, Davender Ghai won the right to be cremated on a traditional funeral pyre. Mr Ghai agreed that he was willing to be cremated within existing rules with his funeral pyre ‘enclosed in a structure.’ Dailymail.UK reports Davender Ghai was refused permission for the ceremony by Newcastle City Council and lost a challenge to that decision at the High Court in London in May last year. But today the Master of the Rolls, Lord Neuberger, who headed a panel of three appeal judges, over turned those rulings. He said: … it seems to us that Mr Ghai's religious and personal beliefs as to how his remains should be cr