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India treated me with disdain, trashed my work: Rushdie

Author Salman Rushdie, who has just been given freedom from a death fatwa by Iran, says the biggest loss during the last ten years of hiding was that his relationship with India was thoroughly damaged.

Rushdie feels hurt and humiliated by India. He feels that the country has treated him with disdain, declared him persona non grata and trashed his work.

In his first interview, since Iran dissociated itself from the fatwa delivered by Ayatollah Khomeini following the publication of Satanic Verses, Rushdie told Sunday magazine, ''India banned the book without even having read it. They prevented me from going to India. I am still banned from entering that country despite the fact that I have a right to go there, that I have non-resident Indian status by virtue of having been born there and despite the fact that I have property there.''

Rushdie said he had been banned by the Indian government from entering the Nehru Centre in London. When he was in New York during the 50th anniversary of India's Independence, the Indian consulate refused to let him go to the celebrations saying that he was persona non grata.

''I'm forbidden to step into India, even step into Indian buildings abroad. It is a terrible feeling of rejection.''

''What also hurts is that from my own country there was nothing like the European campaigns. Is this the reward for a lifetime's work? It's like a divorce in which one person doesn't want to get divorced and is left alone. What can you do? You can be left pining or you can get away from it too,'' Rushdie said.

The celebrated author was also bitter about the refusal to let him film Midnight's Children in India.

''There is certain amount of vindictiveness. I wanted to participate in the 50th anniversary celebrations in some way so I decided to publish an anthology of Indian writing. It took me a great deal of time for virtually no reward. In fact I was trashed in India and with such vindictiveness,'' he said.

He denied that his anthology of Indian writing was biased against vernacular writers. ''I read everything that I could read from the vernacular that had been translated and I didn't like it. All anthologies get criticised for what is left out but the nastiness was disappointing. I felt insulted by the attitude shown to me and I felt it was a conscious insult.''

The ban against Satanic Verses came after Rushdie gave an interview to Sunday in September 1988. ''It is the politicians who caused the riots, not the book. We have investigated these riots. People had no idea who I was. They were just wheeled out into the streets.''

Asked how India continued to remain a theme even in his next novel, the Booker Prize winner said the story of the book begins in India and then leaves India.

''When I was writing it, I felt I was saying goodbye. I felt I was leaving the country and would never come here. I will never write about India again after this.''

Rushdie said he missed Bombay. ''I have created a Bombay that I use artistically. But enough is enough. I don't want to become an exiled writer who keeps sighing for the past. I don't want to fall into the trap of an exile. I don't want to keep on writing about a place I am not visiting. That would be phoney.''

Asked whether he had any hopes that the ban on the book will be lifted some day in India, the author said he did not see it happening.

''Why would they, unless the people clearly desired it? Even Midnight's Children cannot be filmed there. I am used to disappointments when it comes to India.''

He said the nuclear tests were 'fantastic foolishness'. The sort of logic that the United States had it so why should not India, was the logic of the playground.

''But once I was very passionate about the Indian political movement. Now I see things dispassionately. I don't even accept invitations to comment on India.''

UNI

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