A resident of Dhar in Madhya Pradesh welcomed a Bharatiya Janata Party leader with a garland of shoes on Sunday when he was campaigning for the civic body elections. The man said he was protesting against the action authorities took against residents who wanted to complain about the shortage of water.

Dinesh Sharma, the BJP candidate in Dhamnod, was meeting voters on Sunday when the man forced him to wear the garland of shoes as he moved towards him to touch his feet.

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“There’s an acute water problem in the town,” the man told ANI. “Almost 200 of us had complained about it in the nagar panchayat. When the women went to the chairperson to complain, a complaint was registered against them. They were called multiple times to the police station, even at night. So I did this.”

Later, Sharma said he was “like their child” and would “sit and talk” about the voters’ problems. “They are one of my own,” he was quoted as saying. “There must have been something that upset him and he acted like that.”