{"id":13142,"date":"2013-11-07T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2013-11-07T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/2013\/11\/07\/uk-prime-minister-visits-neasden-temple-for-diwali\/"},"modified":"2013-11-07T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2013-11-07T12:00:00","slug":"uk-prime-minister-visits-neasden-temple-for-diwali","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/2013\/11\/07\/uk-prime-minister-visits-neasden-temple-for-diwali\/","title":{"rendered":"UK Prime Minister Visits Neasden Temple for Diwali"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.asianimage.co.uk\/news\/10784874.Prime_Minister_visits_Neasden_Temple_for_Diwali\/\">Source<\/a><\/p>\n<p>LONDON, ENGLAND, November 5, 2013 (ASian Image): The values of the UK&#8217;s Indian community should be &#8220;ever more involved&#8221; in shaping British life, David Cameron said today, as he visited one of the biggest Hindu temples outside India.<\/p>\n<p>The Prime Minister said he wanted &#8220;many more British Indians&#8221; in Parliament after arriving at Shri Swaminarayan Mandir in Neasden, north-west London, with wife Samantha to celebrate the Hindu festival Diwali.<\/p>\n<p>The couple removed their shoes before entering as a customary mark of respect, while Mr Cameron was also decorated with a tilak &#8212; the red dot on the forehead adopted by Hindu worshippers on religious festivals.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to thousands of worshippers gathered in the temple&#8217;s main hall, Mr. Cameron said: &#8220;I think of the values that you are celebrating today &#8212; family, community. Those are the values that we in this country need more of.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It is great that more British Indians are contributing to British politics.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We want many more British Indians in our parliament, Commons and Lords, and yes, in the government of our country too.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Prime Minister apologized for failing to wear traditional Indian clothes during the visit after describing Mrs. Cameron&#8217;s sari dress as &#8220;magnificent.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He told worshippers he will soon make his third official visit to India as Prime Minister and said the British Indian community could help build relations with the Asian country.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is a vitally important friendship for the United Kingdom,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Yes we have a shared language, we have cultural ties, we have a shared past, but what really matters is how we can work together now and in the future.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We want to be the partner of choice for India.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>See video report here: http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-24810905<br \/>And photo gallery here (largely devoted to Mrs. Cameron&#8217;s spectacular sari): http:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/femail\/article-2487180\/Samantha-Cameron-glitters-spectacular-autumnal-sari-celebrates-Diwali-visit-Hindu-temple.html<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Source LONDON, ENGLAND, November 5, 2013 (ASian Image): The values of the UK&#8217;s Indian community should be &#8220;ever more involved&#8221;,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13142\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}