<p>Prima facie, a fetish for footwear seems proportional to the personal authority of a ruler. If, according to a secret diplomatic despatch recently released by Wikileaks, Mayawati deigned to despatch an empty aircraft all the way to Mumbai there have been others who have equalled if not surpassed her in their shoe-sandal obsession. Top of the mind recall is Imelda Marcos, the wife of Filipino dictator Ferdinand Marcos, who floored people entering her palace after the Marcos’ downfall in 1986 when they found not less than 2700 pairs of shoes neatly arranged in her boudoir.<br /><br />Closer home, in the months after Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalitha’s defeat in the 1996 Assembly election, during a police raid, media crews reportedly counted around 350 pairs of footwear in her residence.<br /><br />As obsessions go, owning shoes, many of which will never get the chance to be worn, is similar to an Egyptian ruler Khedive Ismail who reportedly had 3000 women in his harem at least some of whom he probably never spent a night with by the time he died. His grandson King Farouq of Egypt had no less an obsession – he loved to chomp through at least 600 lobsters every week, points out a ‘Time’ essay.<br /><br />Neurotic love<br /><br />The neurotic love of footwear may not lend itself to a simple explanation but attendant circumstances point to a fetish that seems directly proportional to the imperiousness of the ruler. If at one end are those who renounce power of all kind, like many of the Jain recluses who do away with footwear totally, at the other end of the spectrum are rulers riding the hubris of power and reaffirming that with the accumulated wealth of footwear.<br /><br />Gandhi’s disdain for power and control was indicated even before he became the ‘Mahatma’ when, as the story goes, his sandals once came off his foot as he was boarding a moving train. Gandhi, it seems, threw the other sandal out of the window. He told his bemused audience that it made sense as it would help someone wear the pair rather than being stuck with one. The subtext: so much for footwear.<br /><br />In a democratic country like India, a ruler is elected by the so-called will of the people but that is only a technicality because once in power he or she has the space to be imperious and dictatorial within the given constitutional parameters. Though it may come across as a mixed metaphor, the cocktail of power in right measure can be used to crush any opposition under the foot. Or, at least, get it wiped occasionally as was seen on television when Mayawati visited an Uttar Pradesh village. A security officer bent down and used his handkerchief to clean the offending stain off her footwear even as the chief minister, apparently oblivious to her Man Friday's attentions, was talking to officials and a group of villagers around her.<br /><br />The officer’s wiping action was par for the course and did not merit even a cursory thank you, at least not while the TV cameras were on. And, why should it? After all, becoming a chief minister is mighty hard work and the authority and privilege that go with it amounts to a justifiable payback, so what if the opposition described the official wipe as reflection of a feudalistic mentality.<br /><br />The humble footwear, meanwhile, has not allowed itself to be completely crushed under the weighty burden of rulers. It had its own sweet retribution when on April 9, 2003 a small group of Iraqis in Baghdad clobbered with their dusty, grimy sandals the fallen statue of the deposed Saddam Hussein in full glare of the world’s news television cameras.<br /><br />The glee of the invading United States forces did not last long. Washington’s George W Bush first put his foot in his mouth when he prematurely declared that the war with Iraq was over and that the US had prevailed. The most violent phase of resistance to US occupation that followed exploded any hopes of the Bush administration making a victorious exit from the country.<br /><br />The shoe had the final say when an indignant Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi flung one of his into Bush’s face as he addressed the media in Baghdad in December 2008.<br /><br /> Bush managed to duck in time to let the humble but politically powerful missile pass. <br /><br />Since that day the stature of the footwear has gone up in the power hierarchy and several politicians around the world have had to face these earthy symbols of protest and opposition rising up from the dust and flying at them to sully their painstakingly cultivated images.<br /><br /></p>
<p>Prima facie, a fetish for footwear seems proportional to the personal authority of a ruler. If, according to a secret diplomatic despatch recently released by Wikileaks, Mayawati deigned to despatch an empty aircraft all the way to Mumbai there have been others who have equalled if not surpassed her in their shoe-sandal obsession. Top of the mind recall is Imelda Marcos, the wife of Filipino dictator Ferdinand Marcos, who floored people entering her palace after the Marcos’ downfall in 1986 when they found not less than 2700 pairs of shoes neatly arranged in her boudoir.<br /><br />Closer home, in the months after Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalitha’s defeat in the 1996 Assembly election, during a police raid, media crews reportedly counted around 350 pairs of footwear in her residence.<br /><br />As obsessions go, owning shoes, many of which will never get the chance to be worn, is similar to an Egyptian ruler Khedive Ismail who reportedly had 3000 women in his harem at least some of whom he probably never spent a night with by the time he died. His grandson King Farouq of Egypt had no less an obsession – he loved to chomp through at least 600 lobsters every week, points out a ‘Time’ essay.<br /><br />Neurotic love<br /><br />The neurotic love of footwear may not lend itself to a simple explanation but attendant circumstances point to a fetish that seems directly proportional to the imperiousness of the ruler. If at one end are those who renounce power of all kind, like many of the Jain recluses who do away with footwear totally, at the other end of the spectrum are rulers riding the hubris of power and reaffirming that with the accumulated wealth of footwear.<br /><br />Gandhi’s disdain for power and control was indicated even before he became the ‘Mahatma’ when, as the story goes, his sandals once came off his foot as he was boarding a moving train. Gandhi, it seems, threw the other sandal out of the window. He told his bemused audience that it made sense as it would help someone wear the pair rather than being stuck with one. The subtext: so much for footwear.<br /><br />In a democratic country like India, a ruler is elected by the so-called will of the people but that is only a technicality because once in power he or she has the space to be imperious and dictatorial within the given constitutional parameters. Though it may come across as a mixed metaphor, the cocktail of power in right measure can be used to crush any opposition under the foot. Or, at least, get it wiped occasionally as was seen on television when Mayawati visited an Uttar Pradesh village. A security officer bent down and used his handkerchief to clean the offending stain off her footwear even as the chief minister, apparently oblivious to her Man Friday's attentions, was talking to officials and a group of villagers around her.<br /><br />The officer’s wiping action was par for the course and did not merit even a cursory thank you, at least not while the TV cameras were on. And, why should it? After all, becoming a chief minister is mighty hard work and the authority and privilege that go with it amounts to a justifiable payback, so what if the opposition described the official wipe as reflection of a feudalistic mentality.<br /><br />The humble footwear, meanwhile, has not allowed itself to be completely crushed under the weighty burden of rulers. It had its own sweet retribution when on April 9, 2003 a small group of Iraqis in Baghdad clobbered with their dusty, grimy sandals the fallen statue of the deposed Saddam Hussein in full glare of the world’s news television cameras.<br /><br />The glee of the invading United States forces did not last long. Washington’s George W Bush first put his foot in his mouth when he prematurely declared that the war with Iraq was over and that the US had prevailed. The most violent phase of resistance to US occupation that followed exploded any hopes of the Bush administration making a victorious exit from the country.<br /><br />The shoe had the final say when an indignant Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi flung one of his into Bush’s face as he addressed the media in Baghdad in December 2008.<br /><br /> Bush managed to duck in time to let the humble but politically powerful missile pass. <br /><br />Since that day the stature of the footwear has gone up in the power hierarchy and several politicians around the world have had to face these earthy symbols of protest and opposition rising up from the dust and flying at them to sully their painstakingly cultivated images.<br /><br /></p>
