For over a decade I have scoured this earth for a home, nearly driven to insanity. For over a decade I haven’t slept. I have reached out blindly, standing at the frontier, to touch my home. I have been warned that if they ever get their hands on me, that would be the end.
17.
Neither West Bengal nor Bangladesh is any longer what it used to be. Its golden sheen is now dim, rusty and hapless. Fundamentalists dictate terms and the scared populace walks by with their heads bent—a land of ghouls. Bravery and honesty have been banished, and Bengal is now full to the brim with cruel overlords, cunning flatterers or the unconcerned multitude. They endure, lifeless, as trash.
I will cry my last tears for Bengal with the hope that one day the land will again be fertile enough to grow people. So that one day it might again be fit for life.
18.
When I die, take my corpse to the mortuary of the medical college in Kolkata where I have donated my body. The city will not accept me alive. Hopefully, my beloved Kolkata, you will welcome me in death!
19.
Minu is not just a cat, she is my daughter. I have had to leave her behind in Kolkata. She has been waiting for me for a long time, still sits listlessly by the window, counting days. She had to spend the winter alone this year without my blanket and my warmth. Hopefully, the summer would be different. She wants me back, wants those uneventful days back!
The stray cat, found at Gariahat, had gradually become a part of my soul. I was her only family, her only refuge. My little girl sits in the cloying darkness alone, her home, her warm blankets, her sunny terrace, and her toy mouse—everything has been taken from her. Kolkata, you never gave me a safe haven. Please keep my daughter safe.
20.
Even when the narrow-minded populace is against you, when the fundamentalists are baying for your blood, and the ghouls have cornered you, some Good Samaritan will always stand by you. But when the State drives you out, when the rulers turn enemies, and the administrative machinery is against you at every turn, these people too turn their backs. The well-wishers seek a safe corner, all institutions abandon you, the smaller players look for the closest hole to slither into, and the celebrities turn blind. The so-called friends suddenly become very busy. Only a few people are still there, a few genuine ones, friends who stand beside you with honesty and courage, their only sources of strength.
They are marching in protest, holding candlelight vigils, demanding justice. Who says this fight is mine alone? The right to free speech is for everyone, not just me, just as every thinking individual in this country must join this fight. Such times of distress do not just affect me, they affect all and sundry. If freedom and rights emerge victorious, my personal triumph will pale in comparison to the collective victory.
This is not about me. They are not standing beside me. Rather, it is me who is standing beside them, beside India, in every vigil, every picket and every protest march. I stand with them even from my distant, dark, uncertain prison.
21.
I am still alive!
22.
They have snatched your home away, forced you to turn away from your life and locked you in a ballot box. There is not a single soul or a single loved one that you can reach out to—you cannot even choose to live your life according to your wishes. You are someone else’s property now whether you admit it or not, left to make do with just regrets, while freedom is nothing but a distant fantasy.
They want to drive you insane. If your nerves are too strong for that, then you must leave, go into exile—this is no longer your country. Eventually, we all must let go. How long can anyone survive surrounded by so much hatred, so much violence and so much disgrace? All they desire, if you cannot be mad, nor will you leave, is that you die at the very least.
You have informed them explicitly that none of these options will be good enough. You have thanked them politely and told them you owe them for fortifying you, for helping you endure. Now all they can do, even if they set you ablaze, is to cast you in steel.
23.
I was human; I had a family, and dreams. I too had my terrace garden, my markets, my afternoon theatres, and friends’ houses. Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, because of a handful of people, I became a forbidden object.
What had I ever done to them? With nothing except my dreams by my side, I had always endured, like the countless others in this crowded, jostling city. Was that trifling life too much to ask for?
The king’s men have managed to put the banned object six feet under. Now that the dissenting witch has finally been caught, they have sent out drummers to spread the word, a feast has been ordered, and the fundamentalists and terrorists are making merry.
I am not a plaything! This is my life! Is there no court of the people anywhere in this world?
24.
How are you, my darling house? Do you feel lonely? Trust me, so do I. Do you not get afraid, especially at night, when the window opens on its own or if someone comes knocking on the door? Do you not feel afraid that someone will steal into the house and hide in the shadows? Thieves and robbers have become so bold! Not that the wind cannot force open the window! But then, perhaps it is me who visits, who prowls about from room to room in the dead of night. Do you see me in the dark? Do you recognize my footsteps?
Keep my study safe, my darling. My entire life I have left behind there, my life’s worth of writing, nine cupboards bursting to the seams with books, and my whole world. And I am meant to be fine being away from that world! I am almost certain it is me who visits, a spectral presence that cannot seem to let go of an unfulfilled promise, that of a home and a life of one’s own. Who will water my plants? Since there is no one to take care of them, will my tears suffice? I can cry a river for them, even a sea I can send your way, if you so wish, my darling. Not a moment passes without thinking of you, my beloved. The cat is not there; neither are the people. Still, please wait for me, my darling house! Wait for me and I will come back and clean the layer of dust that has settled over you with my own tears. You are not just a house, but a fragment of the land I have lost, and my mother tongue. For over a decade, I have nurtured you within my heart, an enduring dream that now sustains me. Keep the dream alive, my darling house, and keep me alive too.
25.
All my hopes have been washed away in tears, despair settling like a cloak around me. Separated from every last friend in this exile, I have been indicted of a crime that I never committed—indicted and sentenced to death. I spend my days and nights absurdly waiting for hope, half expecting it to wander into my cell through some nook or cranny. I stay up nights, crawling on the floor trying to find a tiny fragment or speck of hope in the dust. And yet, there is nothing. I have spread out my life to you, wishing for you to bring me some hope. Even if what you bring me is barely enough; even if it is false.
26.
Criminals have a splendid life in India. They strut their way about, perfectly content in their power and the safety it brings, constantly planning their next attacks, all their fraudulent dealings thriving.
While they go scot-free, I am being punished for the crimes they have committed against me. They have threatened me and asked me to leave; for the past seven months, my exile has been planned. Their hateful fatwas and demands for my head have repeatedly broken the State’s laws. It seems I have been punished for that too.
I know I am innocent and so I am waiting—waiting to see how my country can uproot my world and banish it in one fell swoop. To see how long it takes a billion people to finally discover their humanity.
I make this demand because of my love for India; not simply because this country is the land of my ancestors, or the place which has nurtured me, or the culture that has enriched me. Even if the state condones the pardon of those who are truly guilty, let it not pardon the torture of innocents.
27.
No one visits me in the comatose silence of the dark safe house. I gaze at the moon with longing, perfectly aware of how well we
have taught her the art of deception over the centuries. She plunges our lives into darkness, turns and flees with her light, leaving me to chase her in despair. She hardly cares. Why should she care when people, our loved ones, find it even easier to turn away?
A restless wind blows in from the south and breaks the stillness, my last resort in this desolation. But the squall has also taken my last remaining trinkets. It has upturned my life, leaving behind more anguish; such is the terrible travesty of these times. I wish for nothing from the sky. What can it give me except emptiness? Emptiness, in this exile, I already have enough of.
28.
Each one of you must try to find out what is wrong with me. Go on, tell me what it is. You have to, or something horrible will happen to you! Tell me why you have banished me! Have I caused an epidemic somewhere? Have children died, or women been raped, or have there been mass executions? There must have been strong reasons for sending me into exile! Unless you can find that perfect reason, unless you can show the world the true face of the monster, will you be able to forgive yourself? Perhaps even I would be able to breathe easy knowing what I have done. Perhaps then I would be able to come to terms with my exile. I want to know what I have done; I want to embrace you again, knowing you were only ever looking out for me.
Tell me why you have cast me out of society. Tell me about my crime so that it can absolve yours. Find the perfect reason for having brought back the Dark Ages or would you rather have history frown at you in disapproval? And if you cannot tell me what my crime was, if not for my sake then at least for yours, let me go.
29.
Annada Shankar Roy28 had once said, ‘Bangladesh is Taslima’s mother, while West Bengal is her aunt.’ The aunt is supposedly dearer than the mother, or so the ironic proverb goes.
I had crossed forests and rivers to come to my aunt after having lost my mother.
Now the aunt too has turned her back, my tears causing her discomfort, my very presence a source of displeasure. The sight of me now causes her disgust, and she constantly urges me to leave, wishes for me to die. Tell me, where should I set out now to search for my mother?
30.
I am not well, Kolkata, but I wish you all the very best. I am not well because it is impossible to stay well in this banishment that you have put me through. You crush me under your feet every day, choke me because I have dared to speak, cut off my hands because I have dared to write. I have never killed anyone, nor harmed anyone in any way, never pelted anyone with stones—you detest me simply because I have spoken a few uncomfortable truths in favour of humanity. And for that you have taken from me my language, my country, my people, you have taken my history, and my home, my last refuge in this world. So what if I am not well! I wish you well, Kolkata, the city of poets and wordsmiths, the city of high philosophy, the most progressive city in the country, a touchstone of culture. Be happy, Kolkata. Dance and make merry. Laugh and let the world witness your greatness.
31.
While I was living in Kolkata, I used to receive a bouquet of roses every day from a veteran freedom fighter. Back in the day he had been part of the Nationalist Movement, had fought for democracy and the freedom of speech. The powerful people who have cracked their whip, who have made me bleed and shattered my dreams—they do not know how they have hurt him too. They do not realize that his roses were brighter than the blood they had drawn. Even now, even in this vast unknown, it seems as if he sends me his tears to put on my wounds. The faint memory of the smell of roses dispels the cloying air of this place and helps me breathe.
I am a banished woman hiding in a safe house in an independent nation. Even a revolutionary can do nothing for me any longer. Freedom too seems a distant possibility in this lifetime.
I will name the roses, ‘freedom’. And the tears too.
32.
I wait for the book fair the whole year. I wait to lose myself in the crowded, dusty lanes and the heady smell of new books, to soar in delight like a kite without a care in the world. It keeps me alive, secretly keeps my dreams alive, protecting them from being consumed by the dark dankness of every day. I have no rituals, no festive occasions, no special dates I commemorate. I come to the fair to see people, my only pilgrimage and the one spell of happiness I allow myself. The certain certainties of cultural life—the craft expos, the costly card games, the evening cocktails—hold no meaning for me. The fair is the only thing I have, the place where I can lose myself in the multitude. It is my childhood, my adolescence, and all my memories of belonging to the land by the Brahmaputra. It is my language, my mother’s touch, and her legacy. It is a sliver of my life.
India, how could you deprive me so! Why have you pounced on me like a relentless, insatiable beast, with your teeth bare and your claws wicked, and robbed me of my last measure of joy? Your vicious teeth have torn apart what was left of me. Do you still have a heart, India? Does it still beat?
33.
If Gandhiji had been alive, he would have rescued me somehow. He had a generous heart; he would have taken me back home, I know this for sure. He would have stood by and smiled, a warm, indulgent smile, seeing my jubilance at having been returned to my tiny, carefully preserved life, built of a thousand laughs, a million dreams and a lot of joy. He had a heart; I know he would have smiled. He would have been relieved to see me living my life on my own terms, of that I am sure.
If Gandhiji had been alive today, the state of the nation would have broken his heart. He would have called for non-cooperation again, to make a last stand against the terrifying sentinels of intolerance that have raised their ugly heads today. Not just me, he would have saved India.
34.
Let us talk about tigers or, better still, about beautiful blackbucks. Let us not talk about humans—they are too vicious. You threaten a tiger or a buck and you will surely be in trouble. Humans, on the other hand, you can threaten them all you want—you can blow them up too if you want. And those who argue, who try to reason, who try to inspire other people to ask questions—they are not human, they are fire!
Of course, fires must always be put out. The ones which are the most like animals—well behaved, obedient, productive and normal—keep them alive. These people—the ornate, decorative ones who never stop to think—let everything be their legacy. Let them live and prosper. The others, the ones who think, seize them; kill, if you can.
Let us not talk about them. Let us talk about beautiful blackbucks or something like that.
35.
They are all waiting. They are waiting for me to say it. They wait in the hope that, terrified, frozen in fear, I might finally utter the two astounding words—Goodbye, India! Days have rolled into months, and hundreds of pairs of furious, watchful eyes have been trained on me all this while, and a hundred eager ears waiting to hear those two sweet words. I am not uttering the words, not yet. Instead, I choose to believe in truth, honesty, beauty, art and compassion.
The day I have to utter the two words—when collective shame will bring forth a deluge, when the flag of intolerance will cast a shadow over the land, and vultures will fly over my corpse floating in a pool made by my own blood—let it be so dark that I do not have to see the face of this nation, that I don’t have to look at all I am leaving behind. Let it be so that I forget I ever belonged here. I am yet to utter the two words; I have steeled my tongue against them. I still dream that love will triumph.
36.
I spend my days in this dark abyss, where each moment lasts an eternity, so that one day I may be reunited with all my loved ones. I have renounced my home, my life, my family and my society; for them, I have broken my body and soul into a thousand tiny fragments. I have shed tears of longing in solitude, waited and let age pass by, slowly building up the moment of reunion to immeasurable heights in my head. But do they ever remember me? Am I ever on their mind, even as a passing thought? For whom have I wrapped myself in battle gear, a speck ready to take on a behemoth? Can they love like me? Can they love at all?
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37.
One of these days India will banish me to a land of ice. In my frosty exile, when there is not a single kindly soul to provide me warmth and succour from the cold, I will wrap my memories around me for comfort.
Every day in the afternoon, Susmita would turn up at my central Kolkata house, carrying something or the other for me—a bit of rabri or some coriander chutney. She would narrate stories of her struggles, of how she had come to be where she was. Swati and Sapna were young girls, their youthfulness and infectious energy reverberating in the house. Sarmistha would come and read out poetry to me. There were so many others—Shibani, Sharmila—all gentle, loving souls, who would never fail to visit. Jayaprakash, shy and bashful, would turn up suddenly from Burdwan with packets of delicious sitabhog and mihidana.29 Ranjan would narrate funny anecdotes from his life. Those monsoons spent with Sumitabha or the days in Subrata’s company! Giyasuddin would come from Jangipur and Muzaffar from 24 Parganas—each and every one of them bringing me a plethora of dreams of incredible beauty. As my days in exile threaten to freeze over, the memories of these moments will keep me warm.
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