In
Defense Of Taslima Nasreen
By Michael Deibert
11 August, 2007
Michael
Deibert Blog
Even as I was perusing my friend
Dilip D'Souza's well thought-out and persuasive rational argument on
Kashmir recently, the faces of intolerance and intimidation in India
were busy revealing themselves a thousand miles to the south of the
lily-speckled Dal Lake, when members of the Majlis Ittehadul Muslimeen
(MIM) party, including Indian lawmakers, attacked the Bangladeshi writer
Taslima Nasreen as she attempted to speak at a book release event in
Hyderabad, India.
Nasreen, as some readers may be aware, is the celebrated author whose
works such as Lajja (Shame) have attracted the ire of Muslim fundamentalists
in her home country, leading this former physician in Bangladesh's understaffed
public hospitals to have her books banned, her passport seized, her
life threatened and, eventually, being forced to seek exile in Europe
and the United States before settling in Kolkata (née Calcutta),
where she now resides. Her crime? Daring to write of the struggles of
women in Bangladeshi society, criticizing the victimization of that
country's Hindu minority and calling for a more moderate, humanistic
and less extremist approach to faith in South Asia in general. For this,
Ms. Nasreen has been awarded the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thoughts
from the European Parliament (1994), the Hellman-Hammett Grant from
Human Rights Watch (1994) and the UNESCO Prize for the promotion of
tolerance and non-violence (2004).
As an author of strong political
convictions whose own public readings have occasionally been interrupted
by largess-bloated, despot-involved lawyers and the like, it's hard
not to reflect on how minor my own inconveniences have been in comparison
to having tens of thousands of fanatics pouring into the streets demanding
that I be killed, as has happened to Ms. Nasreen in her native country
in years past.
"I was wondering how
they would kill me. Would it be with a knife or a gun? Or would they
simply beat me to death.?" Ms. Nasreen is quoted is saying in the
Hindustan Times. "They had encircled us. After I escaped from a
back door and took shelter in a room, they even broke down one of the
doors. I thought I would be dead,…If I have returned alive to
Kolkata it is because of mediapersons who fought those men for half
an hour and got injured to save me."
The Indian author and lyricist
Javed Akhtar, himself a Muslim, has spoken out bravely in Ms. Nasreen's
defense, stating that "the incident was outrageous and shameful.
In a civilized society, you have a right to approve or disapprove of
anything… What is the difference between (the attackers) and the
Hindu fundamentalist organizations." As someone who has often spoken
out against Hindu chauvinism in India, I couldn't' agree more.
Others, however such as Delhi
Minorities Commission Chairperson Kamal Farooqui, have called for Nasreen
to be expelled from the country and on live television, a Muslim cleric
issued a fatwa that someone should "blacken her face" for
insulting Islam, a euphemism whose suggestions of violence can only
be guessed at.
Over a decade ago, another
writer who had been the target of murderous religious fanaticism and
who at the time was just beginning to emerge from seclusion - Salman
Rushdie - was the speaker at my graduation from Bard College in upstate
New York. Speaking of the demands for adherence to this or that hierarchy
that had been made of him throughout his life, he addressed the issue
of fundamentalism and freedom of expression thusly:
"It is men and women
who have made the world, and they have made it in spite of their gods,
The message of the myths is not the one the gods would have us learn
- that we should behave ourselves and know our place - but its exact
opposite. It is that we must be guided by our natures. Do not bow your
heads. Do not know your place. Defy the gods. You will be astonished
how many of them turn out to have feet of clay. Be guided, if possible,
by your better natures."
Indeed, and be guided, hopefully,
to a more just and tolerant world.
Michael Deibert
is a journalist and author of Notes from the Last Testament: The Struggle
for Haiti (Seven Stories Press). His blog of journalism and opinion
can be read at www.michaeldeibert.blogspot.com.
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