WHAT’S the point in kneeling before a rugby match then celebrating with a trophy that is so disrespectful to those very same people whose movement you showed support to?
A debate about the choice of players to kneel before a game of rugby in support of Black Lives Matter seems at odds with the fact that those players, kneeling or not, contested the Calcutta Cup trophy, which was donated to the RFU the British East India Company’s Calcutta Rugby Club, linking the trophy to the exploitation of India and the slave trade.
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The British East India Company had more than one million Indian slaves, and trafficked slaves from Africa too. It is sickening to think how much of the silver rupees melted down for that trophy will be directly linked to the abhorrent slave trade.
As proud as I am to see our national team overcome our auld enemy after so many years, I think the SRU should return the trophy to the English RFU and say no thanks to a relic of our most shameful joint history.
Calum Stewart
Edinburgh
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