Britain’s first state-funded Hindu school has come under heavy criticism from within its own community over how it intends to select pupils.

The Krishna-Avanti school in Harrow is expected to be vastly oversubscribed when it opens in September. Its annual intake will be just 30 pupils, but there are an estimated 15,000 Hindu children living within the borough.

Yesterday the Hindu Council UK (HCUK) claimed that the school’s admission policy was so strict that it would rule out applications from the vast majority of British Hindu children in the area.

Jay Lakhani, director of education at HCUK, said that the school’s definition of a practising Hindu was not one that would be accepted by most Hindus, either worldwide or in the UK.

The document outlining the school’s admissions policy defines practising Hindus as those who follow a version of Hinduism requiring deity worship and prayer every day, either in the temple or at home.

Candidates will also have to show they undertake weekly temple-related charity work, participate fortnightly in temple programmes, accept and put into practice the teachings of the Vedic scriptures and abstain from meat, fish, eggs, alcohol and smoking.

Mr Lakhani said this definition did not reflect mainstream Hinduism, but was more closely associated with the beliefs and practices of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), a Hindu religious movement founded in the 1960s and better known as the Hare Krishnas.

“It is unfair to rule out other Hindus by imposing on them the strict rules of one particular, minority Hindu group in order for their children to attend.

“Because the Krishna-Avanti school was offered state funding and is being allowed to open as a ‘Hindu’ rather than an ISKCON school, that is what it should be, a truly Hindu school that serves and reflects the wider Harrow Hindu community with its kaleidoscopic Hindu diversity,” he said.

A spokesman for the Hindu Forum of Britain also expressed concern and called on the school to undertake further consultation on its admissions criteria.

“The Hindu Forum of Britain has supported the creation of Hindu schools, not just in Harrow but elsewhere. However, this is on the basis that Hindu schools are inclusive and open to the widest range of Hindus.”

While many Hindus would meet the schools criteria, it said that others “may not adopt such an approach but still practise Hinduism in its various forms”.

“It is important that any entrance criteria is flexible enough to attract a wide and representative cross-section of the Hindu faith,” he added.

But Nitesh Gor, director of the I-Foundation, which has set up the school, rejected the criticisms, stressing that they had been approved by Harrow Council’s School Organisation Committee.

In common with other faith schools, which may require letters from priests or proof of church or synagogue attendance, the Krishna-Avanti wanted to give priority to those who were most active in their faith, he said.

“The definition we have arrived at includes regular home and temple worship, as well as vegetarianism and avoiding alcohol. We recognise that some Hindus may eat meat in very specific prescribed circumstances and the criteria are not intended to exclude them. Broadly these criteria reflect practices which are common to all mainstream Hindu movements in the UK including the Swaminarayan temples, ISKCON and Jainism as well as all the other branches of Hinduism that have large congregations in Harrow,” he said.

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