As an original member of this school, I would like to ask what the educational program would be and also at the same time welcome this community on behalf of the Sheep Hatch Reunion Association. Thank you. In fact, the program is still in the offing. I have instructed a committee to chart out the entire program of activities, but I can just tell you, I can inform you of the general nature of the activities we are going to hold in this region. The Ahmadiyya Community is a social organization with its record of social services the world over and also it’s a religious community in which we lay special stress upon moral upbringing.
So we shall not be understood just by this question because most of you who have honored this occasion do not know us, you have just heard of us as just as one of the Muslim communities and unless some light is thrown on this aspect, on the nature of Ahmadiyya Community and its relationship to other Islamic sects and its relationship to Christianity also and what we live for, what are our ideals, what are our customs and what are the rules which govern us in our conduct and relationship to others. This question would be out of place in fact, as long as you don’t know of all these things. But anyway, because the questioner has not asked me the question which I should like to be asked first, so my hands are tight, they are bound.
So this is why I must tell you that the place would be used mostly for social functions and the children for instance would also be taught here, the girls, the boys and a part of the school buildings would be used for teaching purposes as well. But mostly we’ll hold social functions occasionally and I should like the community members to come here for weekends instead of going to Brighton because anyway they have no place in Brighton anyway because our social system is such that they appear to be most unwelcome people when they go to the beaches all fully dressed up and with caps on, you know.
So this is why this place is very good for holding social functions and have weekend enjoyments here. Families could come, we can provide them with a kitchen or a place like youth hostels and they could come and stay here for a couple of nights and enjoy their family life here and return home refreshed. So that would be the purpose of this place to begin with. Later on, as I have told you, I have already appointed a committee to go into the question of how feasible it would be for us to run a regular school for children and the committee has submitted the preliminary report and they are very hopeful. They think it will be within the capacity of the community to run a school with subsidy because of course we don’t expect the school to be independent because for the private schools in England, you have to draw at some students from some rich community and the MGA community at present cannot be called a rich community by any standards individually I mean as a whole because we contribute a lot towards the community funds.
So from the community point of view, we can make do, but individual families cannot afford to have their children taught in expensive private schools. So I have already told them to bring down the fees to the level where the Ahmadiyya community living in England can afford to reach and the rest would be met with subsidy. So they have submitted a very hopeful report. They say because I gave them a general idea of the amount which community could spend in this course. So maybe you see a school in a year’s time here as well. And I should like your children also to come and join us because I hope very much that we will keep respectably high standard.
Particularly we will lay special stress upon the moral values. And as I understand during this visit to England, the cultural gap and the social gap between the older generation of the British and the new generation which is just cropping up is immense. And many old values of England of which you were known through, first of all, your literature. And then when I first made my contact in 1955 with the British society, then I witnessed those values myself. You were highly respected the world over for those traditional values. They are breaking down because of this cultural and social gap and gap of understanding.
So we what we want to do is to upbring children in high moral values. And because this is also the need of the hour for England. Once you get to know us and I know the conservatives take a very long time to get to know others, but still a time would come, I hope, when you get to know us and you will begin to send your children to the school as well.
