Indian Defence Review

Ensuring his security for his participation in the Jaipur Literary Festival that started on January 20 became a complicated affair because the fundamentalist Deobandi group came to know of his planned visit much in advance and made a public issue of it. Statements and comments emanating from the Deobandi office-bearers and some sections of the Muslim community amounted to open, verbal intimidation meant to intimidate the Government of India into not allowing him to come and intimidate him into not coming.

One would have expected the Government of India to stop this intimidatory campaign initiated by the Deobandis in the bud and make it clear to them that the Government of India was determined to protect him and would not succumb to the intimidatory campaign.

The situation became sensitive and complex. One would have expected the Government of India to stop this intimidatory campaign initiated by the Deobandis in the bud and make it clear to them that the Government of India was determined to protect him and would not succumb to the intimidatory campaign.

The Government of India did nothing of the sort. It adopted what seemed to many as a deliberately ambivalent attitude by highlighting his right to visit to India as a person of Indian origin, but maintaining a political silence on the intimidatory campaign against him. The Government and the Congress seem to have seen political advantages in such an ambivalent attitude on the eve of the forthcoming elections in UP.

As it normally happens in such an increasingly-charged atmosphere, reports started flowing to intelligence agencies of alleged plans of some elements to assassinate him when he came to India. The open intimidatory campaign of the Deobandis was compounded by the flow of reports about the alleged clandestine plans of the Mumbai underworld to assassinate him. The reports were of a general and not specific nature.

These clandestine reports called for three actions by the Government of India:

January 20,2012, was a day of tragedy, shame and disquiet. Tragedy because the events were manipulated in such a manner as to discourage Rushdie from coming. Shame because of the opportunism and cowardice of the Indian State and political leadership. Disquiet because it showed once again that for our political class partisan interests come before national interests.

It is apparent that the Government of India only informed him of these clandestine intelligence reports. It did not take any other action to give him confidence that it would do everything necessary to protect him. The Government of India’s deliberately ambivalent attitude continued.

Apart from odd statements and remarks by individual spokesmen of the Government of India and the Congress Party that Rushdie would be protected, nothing was done to strengthen his confidence in the Government of India. In the face of this ambivalence of the Government of India, he decided to cancel his visit. I felt disappointed and let down by his decision which will give fresh oxygen to extremists of any persuasion. But I can understand his decision. Many of us would have probably reacted in the same manner in the face of the ambivalent attitude of the Government of India which was marked by a mix of partisan opportunism and State cowardice.

The ill-advised actions of some of the participants in the Jaipur festival such as reading out extracts from Satanic Verses have added to the confusion. Certain things need to be clearly stated and understood.L’Affaire Rushdie is not a moral issue. It is not a question of the right of Rushdie to freedom of expression.

It is pure and simple an issue of the obligation of the State to protect a highly-threatened person by whatever means possible and not to let itself be intimidated by extremists. The way the whole affair has been handled by the Government of India would legitimately strengthen the suspicion that the handling of the affair was vitiated by partisan opportunism, which encouraged the creation of a crisis in the hope of reaping electoral dividends.

January 20,2012, was a day of tragedy, shame and disquiet. Tragedy because the events were manipulated in such a manner as to discourage Rushdie from coming. Shame because of the opportunism and cowardice of the Indian State and political leadership. Disquiet because it showed once again that for our political class partisan interests come before national interests.