Public Statement by the Forum For The Protection of Free Speech andExpression
At a time when India is projecting itself on the world's stage as a modern democracy, while it hosts international literary festivals and book fairs, the Government of India, most mainstream political parties and their armed squads are mounting a concerted assault on peoples' right to Free Speech.
It is a matter of abiding shame that even as some of the world's best-known writers were attending the Jaipur literary festival and prestigious publishers were doing business at the World Book fair in Delhi, the exiled Bengali writer Taslima Nasrin was (and is) being held in custody by the Government of India in an undisclosed location somewhere in or around Delhi in conditions that amount to house arrest. Contrary to misleading press reports stating that her visa has been extended, her visa expires on the 18th of February, after which she is liable to be deported or remain confined as an illegal alien.
Taslima Nasrin is only one in a long list of journalists, writers, scholars and artists who have been persecuted, banned, imprisoned, forced into exile or had their work desecrated in this country. At different points of time, different governments have either directly or indirectly resorted to these measures in order to fan the flames of religious, regional and ethnic obscurantism to gain popularity and expand their 'vote-banks'. Every day the threat to Free Speech and Expression increases.
In the case of Taslima Nasrin it was the CPI (M) and not any religious or sectarian group who first tried to ban her book Dwikhondito some years ago. The ban was lifted by the Calcutta High Court and the book was in the market and on bestseller lists in West Bengal for several years. During those years Taslima Nasrin lived and worked as a free person in Calcutta without any threat to her person, without being the cause of public disorder, protests or demonstrations. Ironically, Taslima Nasrin's troubles in India began immediately after the Nandigram uprising when the people of Nandigram, mostly Dalits and Muslims, rose to resist the West Bengal Government's attempt to takeover their land, and tens of thousands of people marched in Calcutta to protest the government's actions. Within days a little known group claiming to speak for the Muslim community asked for a ban on Dwikhondito and demanded that Taslima Nasrin be deported. The CPI(M)-led government of West Bengal immediately caved in to the demand, informed her that it could not offer her security, and lost no time in deporting her from West Bengal against her will. The Congress-led UPA Government has condoned this act by holding her in custody in Delhi and refusing, thus far, to extend her visa and relieve her of her public humiliation. They have once again played the suicidal card of pitting minority communalism against majority communalism, a game that can only end in disaster.