Taslima's visa extended by a year, seeks permanent residency

The Centre has extended by one year the visa for controversial Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasrin, who has also moved for permanent residency in India. The extension of her visa came a day before its expiry, relieving the 46-year-old author of tension about her future stay in India, her 'adopted' home since leaving Bangladesh in 1994 in the face of death threats from fundamentalist groups against her alleged blasphemous writings.

"I'm grateful to the Indian government that my visa has been extended," said Taslima and expressed hope that the government would grant her permanent residence permit, for which she has moved a fresh application.

"I got the visa extension stamped on my passport today and it has come as a relief after days of tension since my return to India", the writer said. Taslima said she was happy that unlike in the past, she has not been verbally told this time to go abroad again after her visa extension, and that is why she has decided to stay put in this country.

"It's good that I don't have to roam in the West as a vagabond. After all, I have adopted India as my country and I have nowhere else to go. India is my place of work," she said.

The author said the Indian government has always told her that it grants "shelter to anyone seeking shelter" and expressed the hope that she would get permanent residence in the same spirit.

"If India doesn't grant me permanent residence, where else do I go? Should I again be going abroad and move around like a vagabond," Taslima said.

However, she said 'the bad news' is that she has got a letter from the Union home ministry that this was the last time she had been granted the visa extension. "If that is the case, I fervently hope I get permanent residency. After all, no less a person than (Finance Minister) Pranab Mukherjee had assured that India would give me shelter," Taslima said.

Taslima, who had recently returned to India to seek extension of her visa and is currently staying at an undisclosed destination, said she was sad that there were so many curbs on her free movement for security reasons.

She said she wanted to visit Kolkata for her writings and to catch up with many friends. Taslima had earlier left India on March 18, 2008, for Sweden after she was kept at an undisclosed house in New Delhi for more than four months.

She had not been allowed to meet any visitors during the period and described her confinement as living in 'a chamber of death'.

Earlier, she was dramatically bundled out from West Bengal in November 2007 in the wake of violent protests by radical Muslim groups there. Taslima has lived in exile in many countries including France, Sweden, the United States and India since leaving her home in Dhaka in 1994.

During her stay in India in the last five years, she has periodically traveled abroad, with the last trip being in August 2009.