HINDUS and Sikhs unable to make it to the sacred river Ganges for their final journey to the after-life can find their final resting place in the North-East, it has emerged.

Gateshead Council leaders have set aside a stretch of river where believers can scatter the ashes of their loved ones.

Many make a 8,300-mile round trip to the Ganges, in India, or to other sacred rivers, where ashes have to be scattered in moving water.

But now the Hindus and Sikhs who live in the UK can scatter ashes on the River Derwent, which flows into the River Tyne.

Gateshead Visible Ethnic Minorities Support Group chairman Bahal Singh Dindsa, who was among those expelled from Uganda by Idi Amin in the Seventies, said: "When we arrived here, we found people who had been a generation away from India, but still wanted to be attached to India.

"They found it difficult to dispose of the ashes of their departed ones and they were doing it on the quiet, wherever they could find a place.

"When my wife died, I didn't want to be doing anything illegal, so the only alternative was to persuade a fisherman to take me miles out into the North Sea to scatter her ashes.

"Now we can do it properly and with dignity, and with the local authority's permission."

Council diversity officer Hindu Nitin Shukla, 46, said: "We were approached five years ago by the support group.

"We spoke to the Environment Agency, which said there wasn't a problem, and we identified a spot. We made sure it was a quiet and discreet spot, with a bench and flowers.

"It is a difficult time for family anyway, so we wanted to make it something special."

The exact location of the site is not being disclosed.

Anyone wishing to find out more can contact Mr Dindsa on 0191-487-3059.