by DAYA VARMA
It was a far cry from the news about Singur, Lalgarh, real or fabricated misdeeds of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), Binayak Sen, murder of the Maoist leader Azad, Arundhati Roy’s encounter with comrades, Intifada in Kashmir, and the High Court verdict on Ayodhya to name just a few episodes. For these reasons, Graeme Smith’s coverage of the burning of Rohinton Mistry’s book and the role of Shiv Sena on the front page of Globe and Mail was a progressive act from a bourgeois establishment. Perhaps Globe and Mail would not have bothered about this episode either if Rohinton Mistry was not a resident of Canada.
Rohinton Mistry is not a Hindu but a Parsee. He wears a beard so American authorities reportedly treat him like a dangerous Muslim. He was born in 1952 and migrated to Canada in 1975. This means that he spent the first 23 years of his life in India, most probably mainly, if not only, in Mumbai. He has studied mathematics, economics, philosophy and English. He cancelled his tour to the US in 2002 because he and his wife were harassed at every check point.
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(Thanks to Feroz Mehdi)