The Beauty of a Slap

“Did you hear the echo of slap?” (Is thappar ki goonj suni tumnay ?) was the famous dialogue of Bollywood hit “Karma” when Jailer Vishwa Pratab Singh (Dilip Kumar) slaps captured terrorist Dr. Dang (Anupam Kher).

Following the same fashion Sharad Pawar, the president of the India’s Nationalist Congress Party serves as India’s Minister of Agriculture and the President of International Cricket Council was slapped by a youth named Harvinder Singh after attending a literary function. Pawar is said to be one of the most corrupt politicians in India but all leading political parties in India “apparently” condemned the slap.

On the other hand Harvinder Singh received an enormous amount of appreciation from the commoners. The commentators on Youtube, Facebook, Twitter and various forums made clear in a quite candid manner, that the resonance of “Pawar-full” slap was the need of time which needs to be exercised on corrupt politicians after frequent intervals.

People from all walks of life endorse the slap and call It a desire of masses for swift accountability against all those politicians who while in power – poison the nation by their massive corruption and kick backs.

Earlier incidents of shoe throwing were taken place in Australia, India, Ireland, Israel, Hong Kong, the United Kingdom, Arab World and Pakistan.

Whether the shoe throwing or slaps make difference to political figures or not but they definitely provide a sigh of relief to the attackers as well the “Janta” infected by the corruption and bad governance of politicians.

As far as Pakistani politicians are concerned they seem to be indifferent on Slapgate scandal due to the fact that they are enough experienced of countering shoe missile either during lectures or confronting verbal insults on electronic media — perhaps this is the reason they consider it a routine practice and tolerate such behavior from critiques “in the name of democracy”.

The shoe story seems to have no end; George W. Bush, Asif Ali Zardari, Parvez Musharaff was also targeted with shoe. Indian Home Minister P Chidambram and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, too have been the part of this humiliating shoe shower when they made public appearances.

Slap, a more powerful and precise weapon than the shoe

Sometimes when shoe doesn’t hit Pakistanis leaders, their party followers call it a disgrace of shoe that could not avail an opportunity to touch the honorable dignitary — whatever the excuse  is, now the slapgate scandal has shown protestors a new way to lodge remonstration against corrupt politicians.

The beauty of slap could be recognized in a way that it precisely hits the target unlike shoe missile that has more symbolic value than the physical. Though the smashing slap on Pawar’s face may seem to be an indecent act towards an elderly person, it is more of a psychological blow to the entire political fraternity, who have played with the emotions and tolerance of the public and carried on with their gobbledygook for several years.