Team Mahi’s owner Sentinel’s Nirbhaya Rape reference demands severe course correction

The owner of Team Mahi (formerly known as Velocity Gaming) who is known as “TM Sentinel” found himself in the middle of an awkward position on his stream a few days ago. The owner of the Valorant esports organization was offended by a former pro, who was caught cheating a couple of weeks ago. A viewer from the stream apparently captured the parts of the stream and shared it with us;’ and it is evidently disturbing.

Team Mahi has just returned to their successful ways, beating Global esports and ultimately, Enigma Gaming to win the latest iteration of TEC Invitational, all despite some of the players being sick and Sabyasachi ‘Antidote’ Bose being on personal leave for a brief period. The players were not the only ones though as the owner of the organization, Manoj ‘Sentinel’ Kasyap, also came down with an illness.

While streaming, someone in the chat brought up the name of Abhay ‘Xhade’ Urkude, which clearly infuriated TM Sentinel, who went on to hurl abuses. However, one unfortunate ‘slip of tongue’ saw ‘Anna’ bring the Nirbhaya incident into the conversation, highlighting that anyone taking the name of Xhade any further in chat would receive some sort of fate even more horrendous than the aforementioned victim.

The video is highly graphic.

Video available on Streaming platform

The video was available on Reddit, which now seems to have been deleted by the mods for profanity.

Kashyap was frustrated because one of the professional players in India admitted to cheating in Valorant to rank up. It is disturbing as cheating in-game ruins the sport and the spirit of every other competitor. But criticizing a cheater must also have its own boundaries.

The gaming & esports scene worldwide, have often been complicit in hurling abuses, real-life threats, and more to others during the game. But, accountability needs to be established, especially for ‘influencers’ and personalities who hold relevant positions in the esports industry as a whole.

Of late, there have been cries from the elites in the global esports scene to curb toxicity in chat during tournament matches. An incident like this makes things difficult when an influencer and streamer of this stature use controversial remarks despite witnessing the uproar that was caused in earlier instances. Unprovoked or otherwise, these should most certainly have no place and we urge all the stakeholders to create a better environment for women in the esports industry.

For the unknown, the Nirbhaya Rape case was a brutal assault on the human race where the victim was subjected to the brutality of the worst forms in the capital state of India. The incident drew large flak across the globe and the perpetrators were subjected to death by the Indian courts.

While we do agree that hacking & cheating are truly demoralizing for any medium or sport, physical assault or threat should be equally discouraged by the community.