Life Chances

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Life Chances: The Girl in Red and Blue

The Girl in Red and Blue

BBC Radio 4 - Life Chances, The Girl in Red and Blue

Told by a classmate, the story of one school and three students who were killed.

The story of one school and three of its students who ended up dead.  The story of Heshu Yones.

20 years ago, journalist Athar Ahmad walked through the gates of his secondary school in west London. The school was what everyone in the area described as a ‘rough’ school but its students all felt as though they faced many of the same challenges and went through many of the same experiences.

But three of Athar’s classmates wouldn’t make it to the age he is now.

In this raw and personal series, Athar asks why the lives of his classmates went down such different paths and why three of them ended up dead - murdered brutally and violently.

As Athar tries to make sense of what happened, he explores issues around multiculturalism, identity and life for communities in the UK, told through the prism of a school at the crossroads of modern Britain.

Many of the students at Acton High were the first generation in our families to be born in the UK.   

In this second episode, Athar explores  the lengths the school went to, to achieve a level of integration that didn't always exist outside its gates.  As he revisits the story of Heshu Yones. whose death would become known as the first so-called honour killing in the UK, he looks at the parallel lives his classmates were living.  

Presenter: Athar Ahmad
Producer: Georgia Catt

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Athar Ahmad tells the story of three of his classmates from school who ended up dead.

Athar Ahmad revisits the stories of three of his schoolmates who all died in violent and troubling ways.  Twenty years later he asks why.

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