In India two months after being forced to skip Jaipur Literary Festival, controversial author Salman Rushdie today hit out a Congress, suggesting that his presence there was blocked because of "useless electoral calculations" and told Rahul Gandhi that "it did not work". The renowed author, who has been castigated by fundamentalist Muslim groups for his book 'The Satanic Verses', said blocking his presence in Jaipur "led the Congress party down the road" in Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.
"What happened there is not Deobandi bigotry... It was pretty useless electoral calculations. It did not work, Rahul (Gandhi)." , said Rushdie.
“A British writer described Imran Khan as a dictator in waiting. I am happy that nobody else is protesting this time than Imran Khan. Imran is afraid of facing my bouncers. Imran knew that he would share the stage with me,” he said.
Imran never read 'The Satanic Verses'. Imran is not a liberal,” Rushdie said.
Rushdie, who returned two months after he vowed on Indian television that he would come back to India after being stopped from the Jaipur Literature Festival in January, said he had "not caused immeasurable harm to Mulsims”.
“Fanatics cause biggest harm to Islam. Immeasurable harm have been caused to Muslims by terrorists,” he said.
“Freedom is not absolute, if you don't defend it, you lose it...,” he said.
“India always had tradition of accepting free speech. Everyday there is a price for hooliganism by bigots,” he said, taking a dig at the “disgraceful votebank politics taking place in India”, he added.
