Black Power salute

MUMBAI: Tommie Smith and John Carlos, African-American athletes who had won gold and bronze respectively in the 200m sprint at the 1968 Mexico City Games, decided

MUMBAI: Tommie Smith and John Carlos, African-American athletes who had won gold and bronze respectively in the 200m sprint at the 1968 Mexico City Games, decided to use the Olympic platform to make a statement in support of the movement pertaining to equality for coloured people in America. While being presented their medals on the podium, they wore black gloves, black socks and black shirts under their tracksuits to show solidarity with black Americans. Both raised their gloved fists and held them aloft for the entire duration of the American national anthem in what became the greatest political protest of the modern Olympic Games.

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