American Eagle Outfitters had planned to market slippers with the images of Lord Ganesh on its insole Outraged Hindus have forced a NASDAQ-listed manufacturer to flip-flop on a plan to market slippers with the Lord Ganesh images on its insole.

After giving the slippers the boot, American Eagle Outfitters which has 750 stores in Canada and the U.S., has also issued a written apology to the global Hindu community.

"On behalf of American Eagle Outfitters, please accept this letter as our formal apology for our use of the image resembling Lord Ganesh on this product," said a letter from American Eagle Outfitters vice president and general counsel Neil Bulman, Jr.

"This letter confirms that we will remove these flip flop shoes from our stores to maintain the good will and our customer relations with the Hindu community."

The letter, dated April 29, was addressed to IndiaCause.com which launched a fiery electronic protest saying the company was trampling on the sentiments of Hindus.

According to India Cause, their page registering the protest received over 4,200 hits in the first two days.

India Cause thanked visitors to its Web site and activists "for their activism" and commended American Eagle management for their "positive and immediate response."

The dispute arose over what appeared to be a case of footwear design in pedestrian taste.

The flip-flops, available in AEO's retail stores across the United States and Canada, caught the attention of Hindu activists monitoring what appears to be a recurring number of cases of insensitivity of American businesses toward Hindu religious sentiments.

The activists attributed "ignorance and insensitivity" as the reasons why such products come into the market.

This is not the first time Hindu sentiments have been trampled upon in similar fashion. Last year, a California-based company, Fortune Dynamic, marketed shoes imprinted with images of Hindu deities.

The company has since discontinued the manufacture of such shoes.

Another company called Sittin' Pretty Designs, a toilet-seat designer and manufacturer, for putting the images of Lord Ganesha and Goddess Kali on toilet seats. Those products have also been withdrawn.

Hindu activists, however, have been less successful in another episode involving Columbia Records (part of Sony), which produced a CD album by rock group Aerosmith titled "Nine Lives," whose cover shows "a distorted and insulting depiction of Lord Krishna."

While the rock group issued an apology and urged Columbia Records to withdraw the offensive cover, Sony Music has neither apologized nor withdrawn the cover.

Currently, there is also campaigning against Kohler, a plumbing-supply company, to withdraw its advertisement depicting what is a "scantily clad" woman that is an "unmistakable" image of Lord Shiva as Nataraja.

"The dancing pose, multiple hands, the hand gestures, the metaphor of water from the shower, too, resembles the flow of river Ganga (Ganges) usually depicted as flowing through Lord Shiva," contends the Hindu activist group - AHAD.