Australia opener Usman Khawaja has raised polarising views with his usage of Keshav Maharaj in his latest Instagram video in which he slammed ICC for its “double standards”.
Over the past couple of weeks, Usman Khawaja has been hogging headlines, not for cricket reasons, but for his stance on Israel v Gaza conflict and his message about humanitarian issues.
After being cautioned against copping sanctions from the ICC if he wore shoes with the messages “All lives are equal” and “Freedom is a human right”, the Australia opener wrote his daughters’ names on his shoes for the Test match against Pakistan and also wore a black armband. His application to wear a dove logo on his shoe and bat was also denied by the ICC.
Yesterday, on Christmas Day, he posted a video on his Instagram in which he put images of Nicholas Pooran, Marnus Labuschagne, and Keshav Maharaj using religious symbols on their bats which were cleared by the ICC. He used “#inconsistent #doublestandards” in the caption of the video.
Nicholas Pooran has a cross on the back of his bat. Labuschagne has an Eagle sticker – a reference to a Bible verse – on his bat. And Keshav Maharaj, a Hindu, has the ‘Om’ symbol on his bat.
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Indians are unhappy with Usman Khawaja using the example of ‘Om’ symbol by Keshav Maharaj
While Khawaja’s point can be understood here, he got slammed and trolled by some people for using Keshav Maharaj as an example.
Check out some reactions here:
Keshav Maharaj is a Hindu by religion and has the ‘Om’ symbol on his bat.
Australia captain Pat Cummins has shown his support to Usman, opining that he doesn’t see any difference between Labuschagne putting his religious symbol and Khawaja putting a dove. However, Cummins accepted that in the end, it’s ICC’s call.
Cummins said: “All lives are equal and I don’t think that’s very offensive, and I’d say the same about the dove. That’s Uzzy. He can hold his head high the way he’s gone about it, but there’s rules in place, so I believe the ICC have said they’re not going to approve that. They make up the rules and you’ve got to accept it.”
