'Curry College' to Train Britons to Gratify Penchant for Indian Food

Brit chefs from all walks will be trained to specialise in Indian food to compensate the shortage of Asian chefs caused by the government's latest immigration rules. According to the Guardian, The Communities Secretary, Eric Pickles is to sponsor a 'Curry College' as part of a new drive to train British workers in cooking perfect pakoras, onion bhajis and other Indian dishes.

The curry college is an answer to the crisis in the 3.2 billion pounds curry industry triggered by the Home Office's ban on bringing in chefs from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan.

Pickles' curry college scheme falls under the heading of "increasing social mobility".

An early paper for the "integration and tolerance working group", entitled Creating the Conditions for Integration, said that the Indian restaurant sector has already approached the government to explore how they can be supported to recruit and train British workers.

Paul Goodman, a former Tory shadow communities minister, and executive editor of Conservativehome website, said the curry college plan was "very Eric Pickles".

"He [Pickles] has a dream: namely to set up a curry college. It combines border control with foreign cooking. It would both help satisfy the apparently inexhaustible appetite for onion bhajis and prawn birianis while also providing justification for the squeeze on visas," the paper quoted Goodman, as saying.

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According to the paper, the idea is backed in the long-awaited integration strategy being hammered out between Whitehall departments, which says the government is to "support British excellence in the Asian and Oriental catering" sector.

Source-ANI