She “had been seeking permanent residence in India, where she moved after spending time in Europe and the United States. But New Delhi had stalled the request, fearful of a backlash from the country’s 140 million-plus Muslims, and has given the openly atheistic author only six-month visas.”
If free people survive in India, they will look upon this as a moment of shame in the country’s history.
“Writer flees Islamic death threats,” from Agence France-Presse (thanks to all who sent this in):
BANGLADESHI writer Taslima Nasreen has left India after being hounded into hiding by death threats from Islamic extremists, her publisher and friends say.
“Taslima Nasreen flew out of New Delhi this afternoon to Europe for medical treatment,” her publisher Sibani Mukherjee said.
She said Nasreen had asked her not to reveal the author’s exact destination.
Close friends also told said she had left India, and some Indian television stations reported that Nasreen was headed for Canada.
Nasreen was forced to flee Bangladesh in 1994 after radical Muslims accused her of blasphemy over her novel Lajja (Shame’) – which depicts the life of a Hindu family persecuted by Muslims in Bangladesh.
The 45-year-old gynaecologist-turned-author – whose predicament is similar to that of Indian-born British author Salman Rushdie – had been seeking permanent residence in India, where she moved after spending time in Europe and the United States.
But New Delhi had stalled the request, fearful of a backlash from the country’s 140 million-plus Muslims, and has given the openly atheistic author only six-month visas.
The writer was forced to flee the West Bengal state capital of Kolkata, which she adopted as home in 2004, in November after receiving death threats from radical Indian Muslims and had since been living in hiding in New Delhi under Indian government security protection….