At a time when the world is mourning the killing of Afro-American man by a white police officer in USA, former West Indies captain Daren Sammy has made shocking revelations about racism in cricket.
In his Instagram story last week, Sammy claimed that he and Sri Lankan all-rounder Thisara Perera were called "kalu" during their stints with the Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) in the Indian Premier League (IPL).
Responding to Sammy's allegations, former India pacer Irfan Pathan on Saturday (June 13) said the West Indian didn’t ever raise this issue during the team meetings.
As per Pathan, Sammy should have clarified things with his teammates back then, when he was part of the franchise in 2013 and 2014.
"Everybody has to talk in a certain way with the skipper with a lot of respect. Ishant and Sammy were very good friends, also the others. He used to come to my room regularly to have biryani," Irfan said while speaking on Salaam Cricket 2020.
"Whatever time he spent with us was really amazing. Now with his comments on racism, nothing of such sort was told to us back then or during team meetings this issue didn't crop up."
"If he felt bad he should have told us back then, it wouldn't have happened in that case. We need to change the culture for sure, body-shaming happens so frequently. We talk about people's height, weight, colour. We can't just hurt someone with our hands, it can also happen with words. It isn't only about education but it also needs to be taught at home."
"I have seen during domestic matches when teams from the south came to Baroda or from the west... one player used to make nasty comments so that others could have a laugh. In international cricket there is not just one person, a lot of people are there. Just for the sake of making others laugh someone crosses the line. This should not happen ever. We need to educate our kids about all this," he further added.
While the Caribbean player did not specify who directed those racial slurs at him, cricket fans recently dug out an old Instagram post of Ishant Sharma in which the India pacer was clearly calling Sammy by that name.
In that post from 14th May 2014, Ishant can be seen posing for a selfie with his former SRH teammates Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Sammy, Dale Steyn and he captioned the picture as: “Me, bhuvi, kaluu and gun sunrisers”.
Ishant is yet to say a word in his defence. On the other hand, Sammy has promised to confront his former SRH teammates over the racist barb.
