New Delhi : Hitherto, prominent personalities have had footwear thrown at them but without contact being made. Union Agriculture Minister is the first dignitory to be assaulted. Pawar was slapped by a turbaned Sikh man, Harvinder Singh, who also took out his kirpan when security guards tried to overpower him and whisk him away. He was later arrested. Here is a timeline of previous attacks:
April 7, 2009 – Hindi daily Dainik Jagran journalist Jarnail Singh, miffed at union Home Minister P.Chidambaram’s refusal to discuss Congress leader Jagdish Tytler’s alleged involvement in the 1984 anti-Sikh riot cases, hurls his shoes at the minister at the Congress headquarters. The shoes missed the minister.
April 17, 2009 – A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) worker hurls his slipper at senior party leader Lal Krishna Advani in Madhya Pradesh, but missed the target.
April 28, 2009 – A slipper was thrown at then Karnataka Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa at a BJP rally. The slipper landed far from the dais.
April 26, 2009 – A shoe was hurled at Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during election campaign in Ahmedabad by a 21-year-old computer engineering student Hitesh Chauhan. The shoe fell way short of the target.
Aug 15, 2010 – Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah was targeted when a suspended police constable, Abdulla Ahad Jaan, hurled a shoe at him during the Independence Day celebrations in Srinagar.
Feb 6, 2011 – Former Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf was attacked by a man who threw a shoe at him as he was upset over the US detention of a Pakistani national.
March 24, 2011 – Yoga guru Baba Ramdev had a close shave when a Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) trooper Mitu Singh Rathore hurled his boot at him. Rathore was angered by Ramdev’s long speech on corruption instead of a yoga demonstration at a camp in Nagpur.
April 26, 2011 – A former lawyer from Madhya Pradesh, Manoj Sharma, flung a slipper at the former Commonwealth Games (CWG) Organising Committee chief Suresh Kalmadi inside the Patiala House court premises.
June 6, 2011 – A man posing as a journalist tried to attack Congress spokesman Janardan Dwivedi with his shoe at a press conference at the party headquarters.
Oct 12, 2011 – Senior lawyer and Team Anna member Prashant Bhushan was bashed up by three youths in his Supreme Court chamber by members of right-wing outfits — Inder Verma, Vishnu Gupta and Tejender Pal.
Oct 18, 2011 – A slipper was hurled at India Against Corruption leader, Arvind Kejriwal in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh by a youth named Jeetendra Pathak, 35. The slipper missed him narrowly.
IANS
