Exiled Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasreen has asked West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee why she was against her return to Kolkata when she (Nasreen) is a legal migrant from Bangladesh. This was after Mamata’s announcement that she would shelter Bangladeshi migrants.

Nasreen tweeted late Monday night, “Mamata B is for Bangladeshi migrants who enter India illegally. I’m from Bangladesh too, but Mamata is against me, bcoz I entered India legally?”

The controversy was triggered by Narendra Modi’s statements in campaign rallies that all Bangladeshi “infiltrators” would be deported after May 16.

Reacting to this, Mamata had said she would give shelter to all and not allow a single person to be deported. “I will never allow this to happen,” said Mamata. She charged Modi with using religion to woo voters and seeking to divide them. She also said the Assam violence was a fallout of such utterances against Muslim migrants. She said her administration has been asked to give shelter to anyone coming from violence-hit Kokrajhar in Assam.

Nasreen had been forced to leave Kolkata — which she had adopted as a second home after being driven out of Bangladesh — when Muslim groups in Kolkata protested against her writings and demanded that she leave the state. Violence broke out in parts of Kolkata in 2007 during the Left Front regime and she was “smuggled out” before being given temporary shelter in Rajasthan and then in Delhi. Eventually, her attempts to come back to Kolkata have been thwarted as the “fatwa” from Muslim groups remained in effect.

The controversial Bangladeshi author also reacted to several other decisions taken against her by the present regime, which include banning telecast by a Bengali channel of a serial based on a story she has written in response to demands by Muslim groups.

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