Indian-origin Major in UK returns honour in protest

London, August 30 

A former Indian-origin soldier-turned-politician in the UK has returned his Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) to protest what he feels is the misuse of the honours system by former PM David Cameron.

Major (Retd) Narindar Saroop, who was born in India and went on to serve in the British Indian Army before moving to the UK, was awarded the CBE in 1982 by Queen Elizabeth II on the recommendation of then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

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The 87-year-old has the distinction of being the very first South Asian-origin Conservative party candidate to contest a general election back in 1979. However, the Tory party member and former London councillor now feels Cameron had shown “demeaning contempt” for the honours system by recommending less deserving people as part of his so-called resignation list, when he left Downing Street following Britain’s vote in favour of Brexit on June 23.

“Cameron’s list, in my view, included a lot of people who were undeserving of what they were given. Prime Ministers like Harold Wilson and James Callaghan gave honours to their advisers, but many were very hard-working individuals. But in Cameron’s list, some of the names were only there a couple of years,” Saroop told a newspaper today. — PTI