On 22 November 2007, the city of Kolkata came to a rude screeching halt as a virulent mob of religious fanatics took to the streets of the city. Armed with a fatwa from their ideologues the mob demanded Taslima Nasrin leave the city immediately. While the Kolkata Police stood watching, mere dumb witnesses to such hooliganism, a morally, intellectually and politically bankrupt Left Front Government, tottering under the strain of their thirty-year-old backward looking rule, decided to ban her book and drive her out of Kolkata, a city she has always considered her second home. This inextricable nexus of petty political conspiracies, vote bank politics and minority appeasement saw her being hurriedly shifted, first to Jaipur and then to Delhi, only to be confined to an obscure ‘safe house’ in an undisclosed location and left to face incessant pressure from senior officials and politicians to leave India. Dark, provocative and at times surreal, Exile is a moving and shocking chronicle of Taslima Nasrin’s struggles in India over a period of five months, set against a rising tide of fundamentalism and intolerance that will resonate powerfully with the present socio-political scenario.
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About the Author
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Taslima Nasrin, secular humanist and human rights activist, is known for her powerful writings on women’s rights and unflinching criticism of religious fundamentalism despite forced banishment and multiple fatwas calling for her death. She has been living in Exile since 1994.
Maharghya Chakraborty is a Ph.D. scholar, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta (CSSSC ) and an avid cinephile and fledgling translator.
