UK Sikhs To Get Ethnicity Status In 2021 Census: Report

  In a major move, Britain’s Sikh community will be listed in the 2021 census as a distinct ethnicity and not just a religion, the UK Statistics Authority has said. Last year, over 100 British MPs had asked the authority to include Sikh as a separate ethnic box for the 2021 census. It is seen as a major step that will give Sikhs a fair access to all public services in the UK. As per reports, in the recent census in 2011, more than 83,000 Sikhs refused to tick any of the choices in the question on ethnicity, ­rejecting options such as ­Indian in ­order to write “Sikh” in the space for “any other ethnic group. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is considering the inclusion of Sikhism as an ethnicity on the 2021 form, but had raised concerns over the issue of “public acceptability” and whether the move would have backing across Britain’s 430,000-strong Sikh community, the report said. The all-party parliamentary group for British Sikhs wrote to Gurdwaras to assist the Office for National Statistics (ONS) with its public consultation, it added. This distinction will give them a right to be able to identify themselves separately from current census options, such as ‘Indian or British Indian.’ -PTC News