The fight over the future of the Khalsa Secondary Academy in Stoke Poges is heating up - as two new trusts bid to take it over, while supporters of the existing team have petitioned the Government to allow it to remain in charge.

Khalsa Secondary School was placed into special measures by Government inspectors from Ofsted in January.

In June leaders of the trust that runs it were given ‘notice to quit’ by schools minister Baroness Elizabeth Berridge, who recommended the Government withdraw all funding for the school at Hollybush Hill while it stayed under the current leadership.

The trust running the Khalsa Primary School in Slough has put forward a bid to take over the Stoke Poges secondary.

It consists mainly of trustees and governors of Khalsa Primary - but with a number of additional experts.

But a second trust has now put in its own bid to take over Khalsa.

The Purslow Group Trust has been specially set up for this purpose and boasts a mixture of former headteachers and trust heads of schools which have all won ‘ outstanding ratings’ - as well as national education leaders.

It also promises to maintain the Sikh ethos at Khalsa Secondary and has won the support of two leading Slough gurdwaras - the Gurdwara Sri Guru Singh Sabha and the Ramgarhia Sikh Gurdwara.

But the threatened existing trust at Khalsa Secondary is not giving up without a fight.

Last week supporters of the current team handed in a petition of over 5,000 signatures for Baroness Berridge at the Department of Education Office in London. They claim the decision to oust the school’s existing trust members was taken in haste during lockdown. Chairman of its governors Anita Singh described it as “irrationall [and] disproportionate.”