Hindu Council UK (HCUK) has had a wonderful relationship with the Ministry of Defense (MoD) on chaplaincy for just over 20 years now. As the then General Secretary of HCUK in 2003 I wrote to the MoD Personnel Department to establish links with the Hindu community with my primary aim at the time of MoD careers for our Hindu youth. Soon after in fact we successfully recruited our first civilian Hindu chaplain to the Army, and the Tripartite Armed Services have received us warmly, particularly their Heads of the three Armed Forces Chaplaincies.
In 2023, the Royal Navy created a position for a Hindu Chaplain and I, as the Hindu advisor to the MoD, endorsed Pandit Bhanu Prakash Attri for best fitting the criteria:
- Personal fitness both physical and mental, principled in faith and philosophy, reflective and pastoral
- Professional eligibility of education equivalent to Hindu scriptural degree level and post accreditation experience in leadership capacity, with a sound sense of spirituality and interfaith relations
- General outlook for integration into the British culture and having good English communicative skills.
The training can be arduous, which requires medical fitness standards, ready for duty 24/7 at short notice.
In addition, we started a World Faiths Chaplaincy at the MoD in 2008 which through its Faith and Belief Working Group meets termly to advance its work on training Chaplains of all faiths and none to give pastoral care to the Armed personnel in an inclusive and caring way.
MoD careers are sometimes neglected by our Hindu youth and we will try and do more community meetings at temples to raise awareness – British Hindus have settled here from all corners of the world and although our spiritual-Bhoomi is India our Karma-Bhoomi is the United Kingdom and MoD represents our protective arm.
Anil Bhanot
Hindu Advisor to the MoD
HCUK Managing Trustee