The United States of America is simmering with the racial tensions after an African- American man George Floyd died after being roughly handled by Minneapolis police officers on May 25, as many cities are under riots and looting.
However, this incidence has also given people the courage to come out and talked about their own experiences of facing any sort of racism or abuse due to the color of their skin and one such individual is former India fast bowler, Karnataka’s Dodda Ganesh.
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Ganesh played 1 ODI and 4 Tests for India after making his debut in 1997 and played over 100 Ranji games making 2023 runs and picking 365 wickets for his state.
Recently, Abhinav Mukund, an Indian opener had shared his experience of facing racial slurs and abuses due to the color of his skin. Ganesh was reminded of his own struggles with such abuse and slurs and decided to share it on Twitter. He also revealed that one Indian cricketing legend witnessed it all.
"This story of @mukundabhinav reminded me of the racial jibes I went through in my playing days. Only an Indian legend was witness to it. It only made me strong & didn't deter me from playing for Ind & ovr 100 mts for Karnataka," Dodda Ganesh said on social media.
Ganesh further said that he wishes no other Indian has to go through what he faced, “Well TBH, I didn’t even know the seriousness of racism back then in the 90s. And there was no platform to express it as well. Hope no Indian in the future goes through such ordeal.”
On Wednesday, Mukund said people should be allowed to talk about their experiences of discrimination whenever they want and it has nothing to do with 'timing'. He responded to a journalist who questioned why he and Ganesh didn’t speak about it earlier.
"Sir with all due respect I think people should be allowed to talk whenever they are comfortable doing so, it's not about the timing according to me. In any case, I spoke about this in the middle of a Test series in Sri Lanka," Mukund wrote.
(India Today inputs)
