Taslima can stay in India for 6 more months

Exiled Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen has been given another six-month extension of her residential permit from mid-February.

"I received my passport from the Foreigners Registration Office on Thursday and it was mentioned that my residential permit had been extended by another six months," Taslima, who had earlier been given a six-month residential permit till February 17, told PTI in Kolkata.

"I am still hopeful about my plea for citizenship being granted by the Centre," she said.

The writer, who has been based in Kolkata for quite some time, said if Indian citizenship could not be granted to her she should be given a residential permit for ten years so that she can concentrate on her creative pursuits.

"Will the Indian government not consider the appeal of a writer who cannot shift elsewhere? Here I can meet my own people and converse with them in my own language. The government can help me live as a writer by allowing me stay here for a longer period of time," she said.

Taslima, who has also lived in Sweden, Germany and France, said: "I am also loved by people in Europe but Kolkata holds a special place for me."      

The writer said she did not foresee returning to her homeland Bangladesh, which she was forced to leave in 1994 as fundamentalists issued death threats against her after her book Lajja invited their wrath.