The Hindu : National : Rights of the writer will have to be secured: Lapierre

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Tuesday, Dec 04, 2007
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Rights of the writer will have to be secured: Lapierre

Antara Das

To bear the cost of a building for children suffering from autism
“You must make India shine for everybody”

— Photo: Sushanta Patronobish

FOR A CAUSE: French writer Dominique Lapierre and his wife participate in a disabled children’s rally in Howrah district on Monday.

Uluberia (Howrah): As a writer, Dominique Lapierre hopes he will always be free to express his views.

“I will not comment on Nasreen…but I do not see why a writer should become a problem of law and order,” he told newspersons here on Monday, when asked about his views on the controversies surrounding Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasreen.

The rights of the writer would have to be secured, said the Frenchman, author of acclaimed novels such as City of Joy, Freedom at Midnight and the more recent Once Upon a Time in the Soviet Union, among several others. Mr. Lapierre, along with wife Dominique, were here to participate in the land digging ceremony for an extension building of the Lapierre Centre of Excellence for the Disabled, an institution established by the Asha Bhavan Centre, a non-governmental organisation caring for the disabled.

Mr. Lapierre will bear the cost of Rs 1.2 crore needed to construct the building that would house children suffering from autism and cerebral palsy, said centre director John Mary Barui.

The Lapierres also participated in a disabled children’s rally organised to mark the International Day of Disabled Persons. The self-confessed “lover of the City of Joy” feels happy when he sees that phrase being used, not just to describe the Pilkhana basti that formed the novel’s backdrop, but the entire city itself. “It is an expression I created,” he said, adding that he was glad that the city had moved on, leaving behind the era of frequent power cuts that had once left him trapped in an elevator between two floors.

“But all these facilities have to be made available for everybody…the world knows about India shining, but you must make it shine for everybody,” he said.

Kerala features next on Mr. Lapierre’s agenda, where private builders are allegedly spoiling the beaches by building houses and dumping refuse and waste material onto it. “I will visit Kerala and through my writings, denounce the criminals who are disfiguring one of the paradises of the world,” he said.

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