PARSIPPANY — Hindus are urging Parsippany-Troy Hills Township School District (PTHSD) in New Jersey to include Diwali, the most popular Hindu holy day, as a schools holiday in their 2016-2017 calendar and beyond.
The 2015-2016 Calendar of PTHSD, whose “mission” includes “to develop a feeling of self-worth and confidence”, showed schools were closed for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, while district was closed for Good Friday.
Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a recent statement, said that it was not fair with Hindu pupils and their families as they had to attend school on their most popular festival.
Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, indicated that this unfairness did not send a good signal to the impressionable minds of schoolchildren who would be the leaders of tomorrow. Holidays of all major religions should be honored and no one should be penalized for practicing their religion. Moreover, it was important to meet the religious and spiritual needs of these students, Zed added.
Rajan Zed stressed that since it was important for Hindu families to celebrate Diwali day together at home with their children, we did not want our children to be deprived of any privileges at the school because of thus resulting absences on this day. Closing schools on Diwali would ensure that and it would be a step in the positive direction.
Zed noted that awareness about other religions thus created by such holidays like Diwali would make the PTHSD pupils well-nurtured, well-balanced, and enlightened citizens of tomorrow.
PTHSD needed to develop some sensitivity to diversity in the changing demographics and grant holidays on Diwali and major festivals of other religions so the students did not have to miss school to celebrate their sacred days. PTHSD should awake and understand that we live in 2016 now, Rajan Zed stated.
Zed further says that Hinduism is rich in festivals and religious festivals are very dear and sacred to Hindus. Diwali, the festival of lights, aims at dispelling the darkness and lighting up the lives and symbolizes the victory of good over evil. Besides Hindus, Sikhs and Jains and some Buddhists also celebrate Diwali. Hinduism, oldest and third largest religion of the world, has about one billion adherents and moksh (liberation) is its ultimate goal. There are about three million Hindus in USA.
PTHSD, which reportedly has substantial number of Hindu students, serves about 7250 students in 14 schools, besides an adult education center, in a middle and upper-middle income “ethnically, culturally and linguistically diverse” community.
Parsippany is 28 miles west of New York City. Dr. LeRoy Seitz is Interim Superintendent, while Frank Neglia is President of its Board of Education.
