Wolverhampton’s South Asian community were celebrated at an inspirational event at Molineux this week as the club marked South Asian Heritage Month, which runs from 18th July to 17th August.
Inaugurally launched in the UK in 2020, South Asian Heritage Month honours and celebrates South Asian history, culture and people, in appreciation of the eight different countries across the southern region of the continent and encourages people to learn more about the region’s heritage, identity and customs.
The theme for this year’s South Asian Heritage Month is ‘Stories to Tell’ – stories are what make individuals unique, they connect people together in profound ways, and have the power to establish common ground and a sense of unity and belonging within communities.
To celebrate South Asian Heritage Month, Wolves and official supporters group Punjabi Wolves arranged a special event on Wednesday evening as part of the club’s One Pack initiative, which featured a Q&A with a panel of inspirational local ground breakers.
The evening highlighted just some of the achievements of Wolverhampton’s South Asian communty, while providing an opportunity for guests to hear from a range of generations, people from different professions and sports, including those closer to home who continue to make an impact on and off the field.
The panel included lawyer and referee Imran Ahmed, professional super-bantamweight boxer Gully Powar and Kurran Kullar, a graduate of the Wolves Foundation football coaching and development degree who now works full-time as a schools education officer with the club’s official charity, alongside being a coach for Wolves Women’s under-21s.
One of the UK’s most influential disabled people and BBC’s 100 Women Laureate of 2020 Shani Dhanda – the founder of Diversability, the Asian Woman Festival and the Asian Disability Network – also spoke at the event. As a South Asian woman who experiences disability, Shani’s intersectional activism has led her to helping businesses and brands become more inclusive and accessible for their disabled employees and customers.
She was joined by her 92-year-old Bibi Ji (Punjabi word for grandmother) who lived through the 1947 partition, arrived in the UK with as little as £3, learnt English on the fly and has fearlessly defended her corner shop against robbers. She described her superpower as her unwavering commitment to family – having raised six children and nurtured and cared for 18 grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren.
The panel concluded with contributions from Sushma Rani Mannu, mother of 16-year-old Riya Mannu – currently playing for Birmingham City and previously part of Wolves Academy – and Wolves under-21 defender Kam Kandola, his father Karma Kandola and the Professional Footballers Association’s player inclusion executive, Riz Rehman.
Kandola highlighted some of the achievements he has made throughout his time in the academy, as well as being part of the PFA AIMS programme, where he is a mentor for the next generation of South Asian talent highlighting the importance of support networks for players and parents.
