Hindu temple in Loughborough to reopen after 10-week revamp
He added: "Now we have a couple of classrooms for children to split up and have activities and classrooms for the youth to have activities."It's not just a place of sanctuary for the elderly but it's a place where the young, the children, the youth can come together and engage in activities. "They can take part in classes, learn cultural classics, music and dance, and Hindu values."It's more than a home renovation. To turn around an entire temple in 10 weeks is amazing."
Mr Sutaria said the reopening would be celebrated with a procession around nearby streets on Saturday morning.A private consecration of the temple will take place on Sunday, he said, followed by the reopening on Sunday afternoon.
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Daily Mail
5 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
He was a pilot grievously wounded with 72 injuries after sinking a U-boat. Now, the only surviving WWII VC holder has died at 105 - and the story of his courage holds as powerful a message today as ever: LORD ASHCROFT
For more than eight decades, his name was synonymous with duty, loyalty, sacrifice, humility and, above all else, courage. Now Flight Lieutenant John Cruickshank, the last recipient of the Victoria Cross (VC) to fight in the Second World War, has died at the grand age of 105. His passing, announced at the weekend, marks the end of an era. It seems appropriate that Flt Lt Cruickshank VC gave his final breath as the world was preparing to commemorate Victory over Japan (VJ) Day 2025 – marking the final conclusion of the 1939-45 war 80 years ago. Cruickshank was – and is – significant in so many ways: the last surviving recipient of a VC for an action in the air and the last living Scottish recipient of a VC, the most prestigious gallantry award that Britain and the Commonwealth can offer. In May 2020 he became the first VC recipient to reach the age of 100. Yet the fact that this brave Scot lived beyond the age of 24 was in itself remarkable. For that's how old Cruickshank was when, in July 1944, he carried out a quite remarkable act of bravery stretching over several hours above the freezing waters of the Arctic. In attacking, and eventually destroying, a German U-boat from the air, Cruickshank received no fewer than 72 separate injuries, including two wounds to his lungs and ten to his lower limbs. He almost bled to death. John Alexander Cruickshank was born in Aberdeen on May 20, 1920, the son of James Cruickshank, a civil engineer, and his wife Alice. He was educated at Aberdeen Grammar School, followed by the Royal High School and Daniel Stewart's College in Edinburgh (today known as Stewart's Melville College). In 1938, Cruickshank was apprenticed into the Commercial Bank of Scotland. The following year, he joined the Territorial Army Gunners, joining the 129th Field Regiment, Royal Artillery at the outbreak of war. In June 1941, Cruickshank transferred to the Royal Air Force and, after training in Canada and the United States of America, received his pilot's 'wings'. Then, in March 1943 he joined No 210 Squadron of anti-submarine flying boats based on the Shetland Islands. It was on July 17, 1944, that an RAF Catalina with a ten-man crew took off from RAF Sullom Voe. The pilot and captain was Flying Officer Cruickshank, by now, a veteran of 47 sorties. The task was to help provide anti-submarine cover for the British Home Fleet – the Royal Navy's main European force – returning from Operation Mascot. This was an unsuccessful attempt to destroy the German battleship Tirpitz, then moored in Altafjord near Norway's North Cape. When a U-boat was sighted on the surface of the Norwegian Sea, F/O Cruickshank immediately turned to attack it. A German submarine was a great prize for any Allied air crew. Despite anti-aircraft fire, he manoeuvred his aircraft to drop depth charges from a height of only 50ft above the water, but the charges failed to release. Cruickshank knew he had lost the element of surprise and that the gunners aboard the submarine were now prepared. Yet he resolved to approach the U-boat a once again. As F/O Cruickshank and his crew came in for a second time, they were hit by intense and accurate enemy fire. The navigator/bomb aimer was killed. The second pilot and two other members of the crew were wounded, as was Cruickshank himself. Despite his serious injuries, Cruickshank pressed home the attack and released the depth charges himself, hitting the submarine directly and causing her to sink. Yet the Catalina was so badly damaged that it was filled with the fumes of exploding shells. And the surviving crew were more than five hours from their Shetland base, trapped in an aircraft that seemed unlikely to make it. Cruickshank headed to the safety of a fog bank, where he calmly assessed the situation before turning back home. The aircraft's radar was out of commission. Fuel was leaking from damaged pipes. Shrapnel holes in the fuselage were stuffed with life jackets and canvas engine covers. Cruickshank's wounds were so serious that he collapsed at the controls, leaving second pilot, Flight Sergeant Jack Garnett – whose injuries were less severe – to take over for a time. Recovering his composure shortly afterwards, Cruickshank insisted on resuming command. He set a course for the base, sent out the necessary signals and only then, reluctantly, received medical aid for the worst of his 72 wounds. Cruickshank refused a morphine painkiller, however, in case it prevented him from carrying out his duties. Over the next five and a half hours, bleeding heavily, Cruickshank lapsed in and out of consciousness with Garnett taking the controls once again. But with the aircraft only an hour or so from base, Cruickshank insisted on being carried forward and propped up in the second pilot's seat. He knew that a hazardous landing in darkness was inevitable – and that Garnett lacked experience. Despite struggling to breathe, Cruickshank gave instructions and encouragement on how best to land the Catalina, assessing both the light and the sea conditions before the flying boat came down in the water off the Shetland Islands. Even at that point, Cruickshank insisted on giving instructions on how to taxi and beach the aircraft so that it could eventually be salvaged. Cruickshank required a blood transfusion before he was removed from the aircraft and taken to hospital. The lengthy citation for his VC, announced in The London Gazette on September 1, 1944, concluded: 'By pressing home the second attack in his gravely wounded condition and continuing his exertions on the return journey with his strength failing all the time, he seriously prejudiced his chance of survival even if the aircraft safely reached its base. 'Throughout, he set an example of determination, fortitude and devotion to duty in keeping with the highest traditions of the Service.' The second pilot, Flt Sgt Garnett, was awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal (DFM). Cruickshank was discharged from Military Hospital, Lerwick, Shetland, later that same month. He received his VC from King George VI in an investiture at the Palace of Holyrood, Edinburgh, on September 21. After recovering from his wounds, Cruickshank served at Headquarters, Coastal Command, by this point holding the rank of flight lieutenant. After the war, he resumed his banking career with postings to Asia and Africa. In May 1955, Cruickshank married a Canadian, Marian Beverley, in Rangoon, Burma (now Myanmar). She died in 1985. Flt Lt Cruickshank lived on his own for the next four decades. But each year, in a moving gesture that said so much about his character, he travelled to the Shetlands to lay a wreath on the grave of his navigator, Flying Officer John Dixon. Bob Kemp, a fellow retired RAF officer and close friend said: 'John was an amazing character, very quiet, but with a terrific sense of humour. 'I flew with him in the Catalina when he was almost 90 and as soon as he got airborne his recall of the detail of the aircraft came alive. 'He could point out every position of every crew member, where all the first-aid kits were stored, where all the machine guns were, the depth charge settings and the engine's revolutions for take-off etc. His recall was magnificent.' The death of Flt Lt Cruickshank was announced with no details about where he had died or the exact date of his passing. He was a private man and his funeral will be an occasion for close family and friends. Cruickshank was one of 181 men to be awarded the VC during the Second World War, including a New Zealander who received it twice, a double award known as a VC and Bar. Cruickshank's death is, of course, a tragedy for his family and friends who loved him so dearly. But his place in history is secure – one of the finest examples of bravery it is possible to imagine from a generation of men and women to whom we owe so much. He rarely talked about his war-time service and his VC, saying in 2008: 'You don't get involved in that kind of thing – thinking of any decorations or any recognition. It was regarded as duty.' Like so many of the decorated war heroes that I have met over the years – as I built the world's largest collection of VC medals – Cruickshank's courage was matched by modesty and humility. In 2013, and by that point in his early 90s, he said of that night's bravery: 'It was just normal. We were trained to do the job and that was it. I wouldn't like to say I'm the only one who has an amazing story. There are plenty of other stories coming from that time.' Today the world is once again a dangerous place, with wars and conflicts in eastern Europe, the Middle East and elsewhere. It is all the more important, then, that we honour and cherish the valour of men like Flight Lieutenant John Cruickshank VC, who put his country, his monarch, his comrades and wider freedoms above his personal safety to make the world a better place.
The Sun
36 minutes ago
- The Sun
Lottery results LIVE: National Lottery Set For Life draw tonight, August 18, 2025
THE National Lottery Set For Life numbers are in and it's time to find out if you've won the top prize of £10,000 every month for 30 years. Could tonight's jackpot see you start ticking off that bucket list every month or building your own start-up as a budding entrepreneur? 1 You can find out by checking your ticket against tonight's numbers below. Good luck! The winning Set For Life numbers are: 02, 04, 08, 11, 28 and the Life Ball is 01. The first National Lottery draw was held on November 19 1994 when seven winners shared a jackpot of £5,874,778. The largest amount ever to be won by a single ticket holder was £42million, won in 1996. Gareth Bull, a 49-year-old builder, won £41million in November, 2020 and ended up knocking down his bungalow to make way for a luxury manor house with a pool. £1.308 billion (Powerball) on January 13 2016 in the US, for which three winning tickets were sold, remains history's biggest lottery prize £1.267 billion (Mega Million) a winner from South Carolina took their time to come forward to claim their prize in March 2019 not long before the April deadline £633.76 million (Powerball draw) from a winner from Wisconsin £625.76 million (Powerball) Mavis L. Wanczyk of Chicopee, Massachusetts claimed the jackpot in August 2017 £575.53 million (Powerball) A lucky pair of winners scooped the jackpot in Iowa and New York in October 2018 Sue Davies, 64, bought a lottery ticket to celebrate ending five months of shielding during the pandemic — and won £500,000. Sandra Devine, 36, accidentally won £300k - she intended to buy her usual £100 National Lottery Scratchcard, but came home with a much bigger prize. The biggest jackpot ever to be up for grabs was £66million in January last year, which was won by two lucky ticket holders. Another winner, Karl managed to bag £11million aged just 23 in 1996. The odds of winning the lottery are estimated to be about one in 14million - BUT you've got to be in it to win it.
Times
an hour ago
- Times
We're delulu if we think new words should be resisted
Times readers are doubtless better informed than me, but I'd not heard till yesterday the words (or as linguists say, lexemes) delulu or tradwife. These mean, roughly and respectively, 'willingly credulous' and 'woman who conforms, often volubly, to a traditional gender role'. They're included this week, like some 6,000 other words or phrases, in the Cambridge Dictionary for the first time. Perhaps you, and almost certainly I, will find scant use for them but they're real words. Their lexicographical recognition is not a fad. Nor does it evince a decline in linguistic standards. Rather, it shows the vibrancy of English usage and imaginativeness of English speakers. Not everyone agrees that lexical change is benign. An ostensibly lighthearted Channel 5 News debate about new dictionary entries in 2013 dwelt on twerking. Shown a video of the singer Miley Cyrus twerking, Nevile Gwynne (billed as an English language expert and author of the bestselling Gwynne's Grammar) described the inclusion of the word in the dictionary as 'deplorable, degenerate and deeply shocking'. Less colourfully, the journalist and historian Simon Heffer, a longstanding friendly antagonist of mine in the language wars, recognises that new words continually enter the language yet complains when dictionary compilers have 'surrendered to usage'. This is all immoderately misguided. Dictionaries record usage so we can learn the semantics, etymology and history of any given word. Sometimes these usages are slang, being the currency of particular demographic groups (especially but not only young people). I want to know what they mean; a dictionary that shuns them won't help me. Moreover, these new words are almost always nouns, verbs, adjectives or adverbs. Other lexical categories, including prepositions, determinatives, and subordinators, almost never expand their membership. New words are coined all the time, yet the grammar of English changes only slowly. We have no problem understanding each other. Jonathan Swift, a stickler for correctness, complained when mob entered common usage, for it was, he objected, a crude abbreviation of the noun phrase mobile vulgus. Well, so much for that. Where new words serve a need, they're retained. Perhaps delulu or skibidi (another new entry in the Cambridge Dictionary, with several divergent meanings) will become swiftly obsolete. But there's no sense in regretting new words if, like selfie or catfishing or woke, they take hold. In every generation there are complaints that lexical and sometimes grammatical innovation is 'bad English'. Such ululations are always wrong, and always will be.
