2021 has been an eventful year for Derby County Football Club both on and off the pitch. Despite this, we as Punjabi Rams took on a number of initiatives in which we could support the club. With a focus on diversity & inclusion, the community, and Derby County Football Club we look back and celebrate what we achieved in 2021. We do stress that all of this was only possible due to the support from our members and the wider DCFC community.
We raised awareness of the year-long protest by farmers that took place in India due to controversial farming laws. This awareness campaign was supported by former Derby County loanee and now AC Milan first team player, Fikayo Tomori.
We raised awareness of International Women's Day by creating an interview feature of a Punjabi Rams member who has been following the mighty Rams since 1975. There was also a feature on Derby County Women footballer Kira Rai who we sponsor. Our sponsorship of Kira helped raise her profile as a South Asian role model in the community via publications with Sky Sports.
Our members voted Nathan Byrne to be awarded as our 2020/21 player of the year. We then raffled a signed Nathan Byrne shirt and used the raised funds as a donation to mental health charity Mind. We worked with Mind to help launch our own mental health series called "Let's Talk" in which we gave our members a safe space to talk on matters via weekly Zoom calls.
168 Easter eggs were donated to the Derby Food 4 Thought Alliance which was a campaign to provide every child in Derby with an Easter egg.
Our members supported the Derby County Community Trust by taking part in the annual Derby 10K run.
In the challenging time of administration and reduced revenue for Derby County Football Club, we launched a campaign called #OurCommitment in which we were able to raise funds to provide over 90 free match day tickets to DCFC fans - some of which visited Pride Park for the very first time! This campaign also resulted in Punjabi Rams becoming shirt sleeve sponsors for Derby County Women. This cemented our viewpoint of a one club mentality.
We teamed up with London based cocktail bar, Callooh Callay, to sponsor our virtual advent calendar campaign that resulted in DCFC fans winning 25 free prizes of which the majority featured from the club megastore.
Finally we were crowned winners in the category of "fans for diversity"at the Football Supporters Association (FSA) annual awards. This award recognised the great work we have done as a supporters group. We have also been nominated for the "legacy" award at the first British Sikh Awards taking place in 2022.
Again we would like to thank our members and the entire DCFC family for what we have been able to achieve as without your support it wouldn't have been possible.