Aberdeen University RFC and 2013 Bengali blog blackout

Contents 1 History 2 Decline and rebirth 3 Achievements 4 Affiliations 5 Notable players 6 Bibliography 7 References

History

Acknowledged as the equal oldest rugby club in the North East of Scotland, (founded in 1871), AURFC has had a long and successful history producing both Scotland and British Lions players. Its traditional playing venue has been Kings Playing Fields right in the heart of old Aberdeen and the centre of campus for the University of Aberdeen, the fifth oldest university in Britain. It was not until 1882 that AURFC affiliated to the Scottish Rugby Union, it was the 17th club to join the SRU structure and the first club north of Edinburgh to join after the University of St Andrews RFC, which is one of the founder members of the Scottish Rugby Union. University rugby is exceptionally important to Scottish Rugby with one quarter of the oldest teams in Scotland being university based. Decline and rebirth

AURFC was disciplined by the Scottish Rugby Union for not fulfilling fixtures in the late 1990s. This resulted in the club being removed from the SRU league structure and forced to start from the bottom division. This was the lowest point in the clubs long and distinguished history. With Aberdeen Grammar being demoted from the Scottish Premier league a void of high class rugby teams in Aberdeen existed and resulted in many university players returning from clubs to play for AURFC. Several seasons of straight promotions in the beginning of the new century has seen the team rise to Caledonian Division League 1 and also a return to the first division of the Scottish Universities Sport and BUCS Leagues and won Division 1A in 2010. Achievements

The club's achievements have been considerable. Most notably was the 2007/08 Scottish Hydro Electric Scottish Rugby Union Plate victory at Murrayfield. This was the first time a university side has ever reached the final of an SRU competition. They followed up this success in season 2008/09 when they successful defended their title with a 33-10 win against Duns. In the same year the university 1st XV was promoted to Division 1A and narrowly missed out on winning the league coming in second place, but in 2010 the 1st XV woin Scotland's top University league. The real halcyon period for AURFC was in the 70's when under the tutelage of Mal Reid they dominated University rugby in Scotland winning seven championships and providing countless players and captains for Scottish Universities. In 1975, the Scottish Universities team that beat England away had 10 Aberdeen players in the fifteen. Affiliations

AURFC is a full member of Aberdeen University Sports Union and the Scottish Rugby Union. Notable players

The club throughout history has boasted some impressive individual rugby players and have represented Scotland and the British and Irish Lions.

Since the dawn of the professional era, the club has not had any Scottish international or British Lions players again but annually boasts several age group Scottish internationals and in 2008/09 had 15 players selected for the Scottish Universities squad. Ronald S. Cummings, the first AURFC international cap in 1921, when he played against Wales for Scotland John Robert Stephen Innes, Scotland in 1939 and 1946 E.T.S Michie, the first University of Aberdeen British and Irish Lions player in the 1955 tour to South Africa Bibliography Godwin, Terry Complete Who's Who of International Rugby (Cassell, 1987, ISBN 0-7137-1838-2) Jones, J.R. Encyclopedia of Rugby Football (Robert Hale, London, 1958) Massie, Allan A Portrait of Scottish Rugby (Polygon, Edinburgh; ISBN 0-904919-84-6)

2013 Bengali blog blackout and Aberdeen University RFC

On 4 April 2013 (0700 GMT) all Bengali blogs were blacked out for an indefinite time to protest the arrest of four bloggers in Bangladesh. These blogs and bloggers want the unconditional release of those arrested bloggers. A fundamentalist group named Hefajat-e-Islam Bangladesh has started a countrywide campaign to hang freethinking bloggers, and they want tough blasphemy laws. In response, the government has started monitoring Bengali blog sites and sending letters to their authorities to terminate the alleged "anti-religious" blogs and provide information about the alleged "anti-religious" bloggers. Individual bloggers show their solidarity with this blackout by changing their profile photos on Facebook and by twitting with the #MuzzleMeNot hash tag. Different international organizations have expressed deep concern about taking freethinking bloggers into custody. After a 92 hours long blackout, blogs returned online by publishing a press release on their central Facebook page. Background

From the beginning of the Shahbag protest, bloggers came out on the streets to demand capital punishment of Abdul Quader Molla, a war criminal of the Bangladesh liberation war and a leader of Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami. During the protests, a controversial author, pro-Shahbag blogger & online activist named Sunnyur Rahman, popularly known as 'Nastik Nobi' (Atheist Prophet) in the blog community, was stabbed on 7 March 2013, another pro-Shahbag blogger Ahmed Rajib Haider who was critical of Jamaat-e-Islami, was also killed by a few Jamaat activists. Afterwards, a Jamaat backed Islamic fundamentalist organisation started a violent protest demanding the death penalty for all allegedly "anti-Islamic" bloggers, and they termed all participants of the Shahbag movement as atheist. The spokesperson of the Shahbag movement Imran H. Sharkar said, Hifazat-e-Islam is desperate to thwart the war crimes trial and the process of banning Jamaat-e-Islami.

Afterwards, the government of Bangladesh started monitoring the blogosphere and sent letters to the Bengali blog authorities to terminate the alleged "anti-religious" blogs and to provide information about the alleged "anti-religious" bloggers. On the night of 1 April 2013, three bloggers were arrested by the detective branch (DB) police. Blogger Rasel Pervez, a prominent physicist and blogger and Mashiur Rahman Biplob were arrested on 1 April 2013 from their house. Subrata Adhikari Shuvo, who is a masters student of the Bengali department at the University of Dhaka, was also arrested on the same day from his university dormitory. Another blogger Asif Mohiuddin was called to the police station on 3 April 2013, and when he went there, he was arrested. Earlier, the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission forced the Bengali blog somewhereinblog.net to remove all writings of Asif Mohiuddin. The move was criticized by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Center for Inquiry, Reporters Without Borders, Committee to Protect Journalists, and several other bodies. See also Worldwide Protests for Free Expression in Bangladesh
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