KOLKATA: Celebrated author Salman Rushdie has busted the Bengal government's cover-up, putting a countrywide shame under global glare. Rushdie issued a statement on Friday blaming Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee for stopping him from coming to Kolkata, and saying that he would return to the country "as soon as good sense prevails".
Rushdie minced no words in his single-page statement: "The day before I was due to travel to Kolkata we were informed that the Kolkata Police would refuse to allow me to enter the city. If I flew there, I was told, I would be put on the next plane back. I was also told that this was at the request of the Chief Minister. I remember that after the Jaipur festival last year Mamata Banerjee had said she would not allow me to enter Kolkata. It would appear that she has made good that threat."
The state government seemed rattled by Rushdie's plainspeak and couldn't decide how to react. Planning and development minister Rachpal Singh said Rushdie had been invited but had turned it down. Asked if the state government had invited the author, Rachpal said: "Why will we invite? Those who are organizing this did so. But he declined. It was his own call."
While senior officials continued to deny they had any knowledge of Rushdie's visit or why it was cancelled, Trinamool Congress MP Sultan Ahmed virtually gave away the story by boasting that "the government was right in stopping him". "He would have inflamed passions which doesn't augur well for a peaceful state like Bengal," he said on Friday.
There seemed to be an attempt to pass the blame to the organizers of Kolkata Literary Meet, Gameplan, but Rushdie's open letter has left the Bengal government with quite some damage control to do.
Rushdie has said he arrived in Delhi on January 22 at the invitation of the distributors of the film Midnight's Children and Kolkata was very much on the itinerary. Rushdie, who was not invited to the Jaipur Literature Festival this year, said he was looking forward to Kolkata. "I was planning to take part in a session at the Kolkata Lit Meet along with the scheduled speakers Deepa Mehta, Rahul Bose, and Ruchir Joshi. The organizers were fully aware of this, and had asked me to appear as a "surprise guest". If they now deny this, that is dishonest. They actually paid for my plane ticket," says Rushdie in his statement.
Tridib Chatterjee, general secretary of the Publishers and Book Sellers Guild, accused Rushdie of lying. "This is not true. He is lying. The Kolkata Book Fair organizers had never invited him. I have said this before and still do so. The Kolkata Literary Meet, which had a scheduled segment on Midnight's Children, is organized by a different agency called Gameplan. We have no control over them, but since they are a part of the Kolkata Book Fair, all schedules were given to us in advance. Deepa Mehta and Rahul Bose were on the list of speakers, not Rushdie. I will speak to them on this," he said.
Gameplan director Jeet Banerjee said he had no comment to offer.
Rushdie rebutted this with a tweets: "The simple fact is that Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee ordered the police to block my arrival. I did not get 'friendly advice' to stay away from Kolkata. I was told the police would put me on next plane out... The police gave my full itinerary to the press and called Muslim leaders, clearly inciting protests."
Rushdie alleges that police made his visit to Kolkata impossible. "A police source actually issued full details of my proposed itinerary to the press, which flight I was to arrive on, where I would stay, when I would go to the Kolkata lit meet, on what flight I would leave. This was a clear invitation to troublemakers to do their worst and about 100 people duly turned up at the airport to oppose my arrival. I can't help feeling that this too was a part of the authorities' plan."
The Shahi Imam of Tipu Sultan Mosque backed Rushdie when he thanked Mamata for stopping the writer's visit. "I had informed Mamata that Rushdie's visit will disrupt communal harmony in Kolkata. She assured us that Rushdie would not be allowed to enter the city," Syed Noor-ur-Rehman Barkati said.
Rushdie, who spent five days in Mumbai meeting up with friends and relatives, went back to America "hurt". He said, "I am an overseas citizen of India, and am proud to be one. It is a shame that this does not allow me the freedom of movement within India to which any Indian is entitled by right."
The writer has often mentioned that literature and cinema are victims of cultural terrorism. He was happy that his film didn't face any problem but said: "What is happening in India nowadays is an accumulating scandal and a growing disgrace to this great nation. The assaults upon the artistic and intellectual freedoms of, for example, Maqbool Fida Hussain, Rohinton Mistry, AK Ramanujan, James Laine, Deepa Mehta, Ashis Nandy, Kamal Haasan and others add up to what I have called a cultural Emergency and what Mr Hasan has called cultural terrorism. I can only hope that the people of India have the will to demand that such assaults on freedom cease once and for all."
Rushdie blames Mamata for blocking Kolkata visit
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Rushdie blames Mamata for blocking Kolkata visit
