New Delhi: Salman Rushdie
- whom Press Council of India chairman Markandey Katju had
recently termed as a "poor" and "sub-standard writer", on Saturday denounced "disgraceful vote bank politics" being practised in the country and said "95 percent of Muslims in India
are not interested in violence being done in their name".
The controversial writer Salman
Rushdie became favorite in a section after he wrote his
controversial book 'The Satanic Verses'.
Returning to India two months after he was stopped from attending
the Jaipur Literary Festival, Rushdie spoke at the concluding
dinner at the two-day India Today Conclave at the Taj Palace Hotel
here.
The event was marked by tight security presence but devoid of the
kind of protests that had marred the Jaipur event by radical
Muslim groups protesting his visit.
Rushdie, who was happy at the "lack of interest and protest in my
visit" this time around to his land of birth, was, however, severe
on politicians of the subcontinent, both in India and Pakistan,
who pandered to "religious fanaticism" and indulged in "political
opportunism", an allusion to those who cancelled their speaking
engagements at the conclave because of his presence.
Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Jammu and Kashmir Chief
Minister Omar Abdullah and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh
Yadav, as well as Pakistani opposition leader Imran Khan, stayed
away citing "other engagements".
The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf leader said he could not come to the
same venue as Rushdie who had done "immeasurable hurt to Muslims"
with his allegedly blasphemous references in "Satanic Verses".
Rushdie said "Deobandi bigotry" and "kneeling to mullahs" had not
worked for the Congress, alluding to their recent loss in the
state elections during which the party was accused of trying to
win over Muslims in Uttar Pradesh with inducements of job quotas
and other blandishments.
Rushdie, who addressed a packed hall that greeted him with
frequent applause, spoke out strongly against "public apathy",
against violence and intolerance of cultural freedom, saying:
"Freedom is not absolute, if you don't defend it, you lose
it....If you give in to the threat of violence, there won't be
less violence, there will be more."
Interestingly, he did not utter a
word on why he removed the controversial contents purportedly
about former Indian premier Indira Gandhi in 'The Midnight
Children' and why the objection on the said contents did not
amount to 'the attack on freedom of expression'.
Rushdie began by joking at being "promoted" as the keynote speaker
at the closing gala dinner after Imran Khan dropped out. But he
then proceeded to target Imran with his verbal barbs, describing
him as a "dictator in waiting", a person who is not very well read
("during his playboy days in London he was known as 'Im the Dim'")
and also one who lied about not knowing that he would be here as
the organisers had told him about his presence as far back as last
month.
Rushdie said "immeasurable harm" was caused to Islam by terrorists
who attacked India, by Osama bin Laden who had taken refuge in
Pakistan and by fanatics like those who killed former Punjab
governor Salmar Taseer, whose son, writer Aatish Taseer sat on the
dias with Rushdie and was in conversation with him.
Rushdie said common people were more sensible than their leaders
and 95 percent Muslims in India were not in favour of the violence
and the things being said in their name.
"India always had a long and hoary cultural and religious
tradition of accepting free speech. Everyday, there is a price for
hooliganism by bigots," he said, taking a dig at the "disgraceful
votebank politics taking place in India".
Rushdie said the customs ban on the import of "The Satanic Verses"
in the age of the internet was absurd and said there was
apparently no bar on his controversial book being published in
India.
He said his notion of freedom was the freedom to propagate ideas,
even though it might offend a particular individual or group, as
long as it was done in a civil manner, without threat of violence.
"A writer is the adversary of power, but power is so scared of the
writer that it ends up strengthening the writer," Rushdie said.
Asked whether India matched Pakistan in intolerance, Rushdie
responded: "However bad things get in India, they will be worse in
Pakistan."
After Salman's Rushdie failed India
visit for the Jaipur fest, Press Council of India chairman Markandey Katju
had said the author is a "poor" and "sub-standard writer"
who would have remained largely unknown but for his controversial
book "The Satanic Verses".
"Salman Rushdie dominated the Jaipur Literature Festival. I do not
wish to get into the controversy whether banning him was correct
or not. I am raising a much more fundamental issue," he had
said in a statement.
"I have read some of Rushdie's works and am of the opinion that he
is a poor writer, and but for 'Satanic Verses' would have remained
largely unknown. Even 'Midnight's Children' is hardly great
literature," Katju said.
"I am not in favour of religious obscurantism. But neither do
I wish to elevate a sub-standard writer into a hero", he added.
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