The Hindu : Front Page : It is like a fatwa, says Taslima

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Thursday, Aug 17, 2006

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It is like a fatwa, says Taslima

Special Correspondent

"I am being uprooted yet again"

KOLKATA: Controversial Bangladeshi writer-in-exile Taslima Nasreen is yet to receive an official intimation but has learnt "from authentic sources in New Delhi" that her application for the renewal of residential permit in the country that is to expire on Thursday has been rejected by the Union Home Ministry. Instead, she has been granted a six-month tourist visa.

"It is like the Government of India deciding to issue a fatwa against me," a distraught Ms. Nasreen told The Hindu here on Wednesday. "If the information is correct, then it is as if the Centre has decided to smear my face and hound me out of the country the way the Imam of a city mosque had [allegedly] decreed some months ago. I am shocked and do not know why such a decision to reduce me to being a mere tourist has been taken," she said.

Ms. Nasreen left Bangladesh 12 years ago following a fatwa issued by the Muslim clergy against her. They were against her views on religious fundamentalism.

"It seems that I am being uprooted yet again, this time from India, after having been allowed to stay on in this country for a year during when I had begun hoping that this could be my adopted place," she said.

Ms. Nasreen had applied for the renewal of her residential permit in June. The West Bengal Government forwarded her application to the Home Ministry. "I have now been informed that the Government has instead granted me a tourist visa valid for six months. In one stroke, my future has turned uncertain," she said.

Wondering why the Centre had reportedly rejected her application, Ms. Nasreen said that being granted a tourist visa was another way of saying that "you are not wanted here any longer."

EU option

She said she has the option of taking residence in any one of the member countries of the European Union. "I can live in any of these countries as I had earlier been granted European Union citizenship. But this [Kolkata] was the place I was wishing to settle in and where I had started digging my roots. After all, I am a Bengali writer and would like to live on in surroundings imbued by Bengali culture and where the Bengali language is read and spoken," said Ms. Nasreen.

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