Simon McDonald, the head of Britain’s diplomatic service in the Foreign Office apologised on Tuesday for calling Golden Temple a mosque during a visit to Amritsar. On Monday he tweeted referring to the Golden Temple as the ‘Golden Mosque’ and was widely criticised on social media. At QBP in Chandigarh @SinghLions presented @DHCAndrewAyre with picture of HM The Queen at Golden Mosque in Amritsar in 1997, a permanent memento for Deputy High Commission’s wall @UKinIndia pic.twitter.com/GFkBT0GcRU — Sir Simon McDonald (@SMcDonaldFCO) April 23, 2018McDonald apologised, tweeting: “I was wrong: I am sorry. I should of course have said the Golden Temple or, better, Sri Harmandir Sahib.”Bhai Amrik Singh, chair of the Sikh Federation (UK) said: “This was a major gaffe by a top civil servant and totally unacceptable. What we need is a commitment from the UK Government and senior civil servants to root out such ignorance and discrimination or we will continue to face hate, abuse and threats of violence.”

Source: Hindustan Times April 24, 2018 08:03 UTC