'Shut our mouth to save our lives?'

Asks Taslima Nasreen after Pak Punjab Governor Salman Taseer was shot dead yesterday apparently for opposing blasphemy laws

The news came as a shock to many. Salman Taseer, the flamboyant Pakistani politician and the governor of Punjab, has been shot dead by his guard, a man identified as Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri -- an incident that brought back memories of Indira Gandhi's assassination closer home.


Brutal:u00a0u00a0Guard Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri yesterday. Pics/AFP

While fundamentalists are rejoicing, this comes as a cause of grief for liberals. Son Aatish Taseer, now an author in his own right, was too shocked to react to the news. Repeated calls and messages to his phone went unanswered. The literary fraternity has also been left speechless.

Author Taslima Nasreen, who has been banished by fundamentalists from her homeland Bangladesh for speaking about the condition of Muslim women in her books, said, "Was Salman Taseer assassinated because he spoke against blasphemy law?

How many of us would have to shut our mouth to save our lives?"
Aatish's friend and author Rana Dasgupta was shocked on hearing the news. "I didn't know this news," he said, refusing to comment further.

India connect
Salman's India connection was close. He fathered a child with noted columnist and author Tavleen Singh, and abandoned them. As a child, all Aatish ever had of his father was a photograph. Raised by his Sikh mother in Delhi, his father remained a distant figure.

His book Stranger to History is the story of the journey Aatish made to try to understand what it means to be a Muslim in the 21st century, and reconnect with his father. Starting from Istanbul, Islam's once greatest city, he travels to Mecca, its most holy, and then home through Iran and Pakistan. Ending in Lahore, at his estranged father's home, on the night Benazir Bhutto was killed.

"I had begun my journey asking why my father was Muslim, and this was why: none of Islam's once powerful moral imperatives existed within him, but he was Muslim because he doubted the Holocaust, hated America and Israel, thought Hindus were weak and cowardly, and because the glories of the Islamic past excited him," wrote Aatish.

So he was indeed shocked when his father hit back at him, accusing him, among other things, of blackening the family name by spreading 'invidious anti-Muslim propaganda'.

Shruti Debi, who was the editor of Taseer's book Stranger to History: A Son's Journey through Islamic Lands, said, "The book speaks volumes about Aatish's relationship with his father."

Violent times
"We live in violent times. Any person who holds a view that goes against fundamentalist principles pays a price. We have moved into extreme corners. It is tragic," said author Sudeep Chakravarty. Indeed!