Taslima Nasrin - when I was in school, she was all in the newspapers. Her book Lajja(Shame) was released and the government of Bangladesh had banned it. The feminist in me got attracted and influenced by her. Reading Lajja was the next best thing I did. The book touched me deeply. I couldn't accept the atrocities people could do to each other in the name of religion. Anyway, my respect and adulation for Taslima grew and I watched her struggle over the years. When she came to India, I was amazed at how our country supported and stood by her. Little did I know that people had motives behind supporting her. The same vote-bank politics that supported her, has now thrown her out of India to win the fundamentalist's votes. Politics and the vote bank have become so important in our country, that you never know when someone is doing a deed just out of sheer humanity. 'Secular' India took a stand to support fundamentalists instead of Taslima.
It's heartbreaking to see such a great courageous mind being suppressed. It hurts to see death threats being issued by Indians and it hurts more to know that the Indian government wants her to leave India, because Muslim organizations do not like her in our country. The government cannot listen to such organizations that use violence to meet their requirements. Where will our country go if people start using this method to get everything that they want?
July 29, 1994, it is said that 200,000 people demonstrated in Dhaka demanding that Taslima Nasrin should be hanged. That's a lot of people. Just to see one person die(which is what will happen to all of us) why are we spending so much energy? If a small percentage of these people could really open their eyes and see what she's talking about and either prove or disprove it, that would make sense.
I read Lajja again when I was in college and then shared my book with friends and cousins. I haven't read any of her other books. In all these years, when Taslima called Kolkata her home, she would appear in the newspapers once in a while. I was not madly following her life or books, but everytime I see her in the news(even today), I'd cherish my childhood feeling of idolizing her. It is a must read book.
Some of her books can be read online at
http://taslimanasrin.com/
Letter from Salman Rushdie to Taslima when she first received the 'fatwa' in 1994
http://humanists.net/nasrin/rushdie.htm
Let Humanism be the other name for Religion - Taslima Nasrin
2 comments:
But I wonder, she should have anticipated this reaction, especially after what happened to Salman Rushdie.
Where is she now?
I think, the way India backed out must have hurt her the most.
Some time back, a defamation case was filed on Kushboo. She crossed her legs during a meeting, and her foot was pointing to an idol LOL.
So much for the constitution that allows for inherent freedom to the citizens. If true, the system must have laughed at the case and simply dismissed it without even going for a hearing. That old India is long gone.
Taslima's now in Sweden
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