The recent incident of shoe-hurling at Chief Justice of India BR Gavai by a septuagenarian lawyer, Rakesh Kishore, in the Supreme Court has sparked discussions in the media and on social media. The debates are heated up with the intellectual angularity of religious fanaticism, caste based prejudices and decline in professional ethics at bars and benches. Yet, beneath these immediate interpretations lies a deeper symbolic layer: the meaning of the shoe itself. Why do people throw shoes? What does this act signify culturally?
The Symbolism of Footwear in Indian Culture
Let’s begin with the shoe itself. In the Indian imagination, the earliest reference to
footwear may be traced to the Hindu epic Ramayana, where Bharat, the younger brother, ruled the kingdom by keeping the Charan Padukas (sandals) of Rama on the throne. The sandals became a symbol of rule in the name of Rama, who was being exiled from the state. The presence of the footwear may be considered as an emotive appeal as well as a symbolic approval of Bharat’s authority drawn from Rama’s stature. It depicts Bharat as a faithful younger brother who displayed utmost honour even to the dirtiest wearable of his elder brother Rama.
In Hindu cosmology, the Purusha Sukta describes the four varnas as emerging from different parts of the cosmic being Purusha—Brahmins from the mouth, Kshatriyas from the arms, Vaishyas from the thighs, and Shudras from the feet. This schema locates the feet, and by association footwear, at the lowest end of the ritual hierarchy. The notion of impurity surrounding shoes explains why they are removed before entering homes or temples.
Mary Douglas’s 1966, explains that objects and bodily functions associated with the lower body are often considered impure because they represent “matter out of place”. She argues that concepts of dirt, pollution, and taboo are not based on rational hygiene but on a society’s need to create and maintain a sense of order by establishing a system of classification.
Shoes as a Symbol of Humiliation
Thus, throwing a shoe is not aimed at physical harm but to insult someone. It represents the symbolic inversion of status—placing the “lowest” object upon a person’s symbolic “highest” dignity. Hindi idioms such as “Jooton se maroonga” (Will beat you with shoes) and “Tera joota mere sir” (Your shoe on my head) reinforce this idea of humiliation. Even idiomatic expressions like “Aurat to aadmi ke pair ki jooti hai” (A woman is the sandal of a man’s feet”) reveal the gendered hierarchies tied to the object’s symbolism.
Hence, the act of throwing a shoe is a symbolic act of causing public insult to someone. Also, incidents are reported across India where the accused persons are paraded with shoe garlands around their neck as a punishment awarded by Panchayats and other mechanisms of street justice and moral policing.
Ibrahim, Y. (2009) confirms that these shoe-hurling gestures reflect similar cultural meanings in Middle Eastern cultures as well. He underlines that throwing objects as a form of disapproval is embedded in most cultures. However, it is also accepted that at times objects are thrown at others as a positive and welcoming gesture too, e.g. showering of flowers and rice on newlywedded couples.
He traces the historical roots of throwing eggs and rotten tomatoes as disapproval during political events, which gained popularity at the beginning of the 19th century. But later, due to scarcity and rationing of eggs, the practice could not be observed by the masses. It regained momentum towards the end of the century. Along with this, shoe-throwing emerged as a significant form of political protest and symbolised dissent. However, the act gained global attention when Iraqi journalist Muntadar Al-Zaidi threw shoes at George W. Bush, the President of the USA, who was considered the most powerful person on the planet at that time.
This incident got appropriated into the popular culture, inspiring similar protests at other places as well. Further, the video recordings and the digital media boosted the act’s visibility, transforming it into a viral symbol of resistance, entertainment, debate, as well as trolling. Ibrahim focuses on the need to understand the protest cultures and how a particular act becomes part of the protest culture.
Shoe-throwing: Semiotic and Sociological Meanings
The symbolic act of shoe-hurling can be viewed through the lens of semiotics and protest sociology. Drawing from Barthes (1957), everyday objects acquire secondary meanings that transcend their functional use and are coined as symbols of cultural significance. In this sense, the shoe functions as a sign associated with notions of impurity, humiliation, and defiance.
Such cultural meanings are not just fixed. Rather, they are constantly appropriated, contested and even re-shaped and redefined. The shades of revenge, protest, dissent, defiance and disapproval are visibly getting layered upon the shoe and the act of shoe-hurling.
References:
Barthes, R. (1957). Mythologies. Seuil.
Douglas, M. (1966). Purity and danger: An analysis of concepts of pollution and taboo. Routledge.
Ibrahim, Y. (2009). The throwing shoe: Symbolic gestures and protest culture. Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, 23(5), 789–802.
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Vijay Pal is an independent research scholar with interests in the sociology of everyday life, education and gender issues.