From Andrew Symonds to Darren Sammy
Oct 11, 2007
Vadodara, India
During the 5th ODI between India and Australia, Andrew Symonds, the Australian cricketer, was subjected to racial “monkey” chants at Vadodara, India by the Indian crowd at the stands.
Read more..
BCCI simply refused to even acknowldge such an incident happened. No inquiry was set up. It was simply brushed aside in spite of protests by the Australian players.
Oct 17, 2007
Mumbai, India
During the 6th ODI between India and Australia, Andrew Symonds, the Australian cricketer was subjected to racial “monkey” chants again at the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai, India by the Indian crowd at the stands.
Read more..
Now, with a repeat of the said racial abuse, BCCI had to pretend that they were really interested in following up.
All that came out of that formal inquiry was exclusive investigative statements like..
“The supporters were praying to the Hindu monkey god, Hanuman!!”
January 4, 2008
Sydney, Australia
During an acrimonious day of play, there was a gritty 8th wicket partnership between Harbhajan Singh and Sachin Tendulkar. At some point during that partnership, words were exchanged between Symonds and Harbhajan. Harbhajan Singh allegedly taunted Symonds with the word “Monkey”.
Read more…
Needless to add, Ricky Pointing (who later calls this ‘Monkeygate’ as the lowest point of his captaincy”), the captain of the Australian cricket team, took the matter up to the match referee right away.
Mike Proctor (from the apartheid era South Africa) was the match referee. He found enough evidence for the racism related offense against Harbhajan Singh during the initial hearing. In his 2018 book, Proctor revealed that Sachin Tendulkar, offered no evidence at all during that hearing. Neither in support of the allegation nor in defense of Harbhajan Singh.
It’s also worth noting that Harbhajan’s biggest defense during that hearing and for many years later on was “his knowledge of English was so bad that he couldn’t have used an English word like monkey to abuse someone”, while Chetan Chauhan, the then team manager argued that it was “impossible” for Indians to be racists. [Read that again. Yeah!!]
Based on Proctor’s judgment, Harbhajan was banned for three test matches with immediate effect.
Under the ICC players code of conduct, players could appeal such decisions. So Harbhajan appealed the decision. And Team India actually threatened to walk out of the tour.
An appeals hearing was set up for January 29, 2008.
During the appeals haring, Sachin Tendulkar, the icon for many Indian cricket fans and many young followers of the game, somehow decided to offer the “No. It was not Monkey. It was Maa Ki..” counter argument.
What followed should be included in the dark pages of cricketing history. Justice John Hansen dismissed the racism charges agains Harbhajan Singh for lack of evidence. And everything was back to where it was. Not just for Harbhajan Singh but for an entire country, which perhaps was at the cusp of using this as a “Teachable Moment” or “normalizing casual racism”.
With someone of Sachin’s stature having the opportunity to making this a teachable moment by educating so many cricketing fans and perhaps so many more Indians that even if one were ignorant of casual racism that exists in Indian culture across all states and all languages, it is simply not OK under any circumstances. Instead, the country moved on after having used that moment only to normalize casual racism.
As one can imagine, the general popular sentiment in India at that time and the overall reaction to this incident was that it was even an insult to move forward with this hearing of an alleged racist charge, as it would have left a deep scar on India’s National Integrity and pride. It became so important to defend the country’s integrity that Indians had to drag Sachin into this, in order to use his international credibility to “defend” the nation.
Even though India won the appeals hearing, India lost an opportunity. An opportunity to teach Indian cricket fans, especially the younger ones, that racism was simply not OK, casual or otherwise. Instead, the incident taught many Indian cricket fans that it was amusing to be racist, entertaining to make up a cover-up story and get away with it. And worst of all, even the biggest hero of them all, Sachin Tendulkar could be made complicit.
What a lost opportunity!!
Fast forward to June 2020.
Darren Sammy, a former West Indies captain, was watching a Hasan Minhaj episode, where he learned of a very common racist word used in India (a Hindi word), very casually, but in a degrading way on someone with darker complexion. Darren immediately recollected how a few of his IPL teammates from his team Sunrisers Hyderabad used to call him and the Sri Lankan cricketer Thisara Perera by the same name. There are pictures being circulated around and it’s easy to narrow down who those specific teammates Darren Sammy is referring to, who may have called him by that derogatory name.
Here’s Darren Sammy’s reaction after he learned of the casual racist abuse his teammates were hauling him with 6–7 years back in a language he had no knowledge of.
He is emotional, visibly disappointed and upset.
Also, read this very powerful interview with Darren Sammy, after he learned of the racial abuse he had been unknowingly subjected to. He brings out a broader point. According to him, this issue is not just about those few players who used the derogatory term on him. He wants to use this opportunity to bring out the racial politics that exists in ICC in general. He is not going to sit back and take silence as a response.
But what is disturbing to me now is how this incident has brought out the same kind of national reaction that the ‘monkeygate’ did. It’s even more disturbing given that the whole world is in the middle of a racial conversation and discrimination right now. Even in India, where one of the deepest set of discriminatory practices exist based on a caste system, there were those who were chanting “Black Lives Matter” and voicing their opinions on the injustice being meted out to African Americans in the USA.
A few hours after the Darren Sammy’s racist incident broke out, the same Indians who were standing in solidarity with George Floyd a moment ago, in a measurably short amount of time, shifted to “All lives matter”, to denying racism exists in India, to actually accusing a black man of being an opportunist for calling out racism he faced during IPL, seven years ago.
Many of these adult Indian fans who are abusing Darren Sammy now and calling him an opportunist, defending the casual racism to him by saying things like “Bhai **** kehna kuch badi baat nai atleast India mein”. (Bro, It’s not a big deal to call people such things in India), are the exact same people who were at the cusp of that teachable moment back in 2008.
As they say, cricket is a religion in India. So, maybe, the Indian society and people of Indian origin like me, wherever they are, use this incident as a teachable moment, and reflect upon the everyday casual racism that we all have seem to have normalized, both in our words and in our actions. If we can educate the next generation of the power of “words”, the differences and the nuances, maybe, just maybe, we all will be slightly better off tomorrow.
Earlier today, Darren Sammy posted this.
The man is a thorough gentleman.
Here he is measured, with no anger, no resentment, no hatred on anyone whatsoever, and above all still willing to believe his friends/teammates and use this opportunity to educate them.
Footnote: Almost 10 years later, when Harbhajan Singh and Andrew Symonds played together for the same IPL team, Mumbai Indians, Symonds reveals that Harbhajan offered an emotional apology to him and that they have patched up.
Disclaimer: This post is specific to the pervasive casual racism in the Indian society. This post is not to give clean chit to the Australian cricket team or to somehow compare the amount of racism that exists in other countries with what exists in India.
