Kolkata:
Exiled Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasrin said she doesn’t find relocating to Kolkata from Delhi a feasible option at this point, adding that “I don’t want to get kicked around anymore”.
Speaking to PTI on the BJP raising her ouster from Kolkata in Parliament, Nasrin said she would instead urge the governments concerned, both at Bengal and the Centre, to allow her to travel to the city every once in a while to attend literary functions and book fairs, events with which she continues to share a strong emotional bond.
“I have been kicked around like a football by the political dispensations who felt ill at ease with my presence within their boundaries because of my literary and world views. At this stage of my life, I don’t want to get kicked around anymore. Instead, it would please me if the governments allow me to travel to Kolkata to attend literature festivals and book fairs from where I continue to receive regular invitations,” she said over the phone.
Nasrin, who gained global attention in the early ’90s because of her essays and novels with feminist views and sharp criticism of what she characterised as “misogynistic religions”, was forced to leave Bangladesh in 1994 in the wake of multiple fatwas calling for her death in the aftermath of the publication of her novel ‘Lajja’.
She moved to India in 2004 after spending a decade in Europe and the US, and spent the next three years in Kolkata until some controversial passages from her book ‘Dwikhandita’ provoked large-scale violence on the streets of the city in November 2007. She was forced to move from Kolkata, first to Jaipur and subsequently to Delhi where she was initially placed under house arrest.
Nasrin, a gynaecologist, is currently based in Delhi on a long-term resident permit and multiple-entry visa.
Addressing the Parliament earlier this week, BJP Rajya Sabha MP Samik Bhattacharya urged the Centre to ensure Nasrin’s safe return to Kolkata, sparking a fresh row of political dust-up.
“I don’t understand politics, nor do I have any connections with any politician. I have even refused proposals for literary awards from the saffron camp in the past,” Nasrin said, “But I am thankful to Mr Bhattacharya, who I do not know personally, for raising the issue.” “Very few people, in the past 18 years, have spoken out on why an author who writes in Bengali should be forcefully banished from Bengal, on both sides of the international border. I have harboured that pain in me for a long and have written about it. Bhattacharya’s political affiliations are of no interest to me. I felt it was one human being speaking out for another, one Bengali raising his voice for another. I am not ready to reject his opinion for his politics,” she said.
Nasrin, who has received multiple international awards, recounted her experiences with the erstwhile Left regime in West Bengal and the Congress-led government at the Centre, both of whom she alleged, wanted her out.
“I still find it difficult to believe that the Left, which swears by secularism, chose to expel a writer with the strongest secular credentials and banned her book. I thought that my views on religion, my atheism, and my entire belief system matched those of the Left parties. But seeing them slip into opportunism made me realise that I was mistaken,” said the 62-year-old author.
“In Delhi too I was under intense pressure to leave the country. The ruling dispensation of the time offered me money and other luxuries should I choose to stay abroad and not return. I did not budge,” she said.
Nasrin, however, felt that the socio-political condition in West Bengal wasn’t conducive enough to ensure her peaceful rehabilitation, no matter how badly she may yearn for it.
“I will be happy if they allow me to travel to Kolkata once in a while to meet my friends and attend literary meets,” she urged.
Bhattacharya said he was on the same page with the author on the issue of her relocation.
“Taslima is a Bengali author, who speaks and writes in Bengali, thinks and dreams in that language. It is not important where she stays. But it should be well within her rights to visit West Bengal whenever she pleases. Kolkata is the nerve centre of Bengal’s cultural endeavours and she should have free access to the city’s cultural and literary events. Both the Centre and the state government should facilitate that,” he told PTI.
Bhattacharya said he would write to the Centre to ensure that Nasrin can travel to Kolkata whenever she wants.
“This has got nothing to do with my politics. I have raised the issue purely on humanitarian grounds. I have said in my Parliament speech that a man who does not strive for mankind is not a man. The life and works of Taslima Nasrin are a living testimony to that. It is our duty to acknowledge that achievement,” he said.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)