‘Outrage is a very good thing’

Author Aatish Taseer’s unusual life story often raises curious eyebrows. Born to an Indian mother, Tavleen Singh, and late Pakistani politician and businessman, Salmaan Taseer, the author grew up in Delhi. He was 21 when he met his estranged father for the first time.

Aatish was also in a relationship with Lady Gabriella Windsor, daughter of the Prince and Princess Michael of Kent. Also, the autobiographical elements in his books, Stranger to History and The Temple-Goers, inevitably make him a topic of discussion in literary circles.

In town to launch his latest book, Noon, organised by Literature Live, Aatish admits that his father’s recent assassination “created a kind of convulsion” in his personal life while he was in the process of finishing the book.

However, he maintains, “If I grew up in Pakistan, I’d feel it as a loss. I’d have had to accept the idea on which Pakistan was founded, which would be a narrowing, limiting idea. And it would have closed off India to me. It would have shrunk my world view and closed off a lot of the classical past of India. One of the most exciting things that I’ve discovered in India is my knowledge of Sanskrit.”

But Aatish is careful not to get into any forecasting for Pakistan that he refers to as ‘La Mirage’ in Noon. What’s his take on Pakistan’s younger lot such as Fatima Bhutto or Hina Rabbani Khar? “The Indian representation is a more realistic representation. The kind of figures like Fatima, Hina or even my father is not representative of a Pakistani reality. It doesn’t give the real picture of Pakistan’s society,” she says.

In the wake of the Anna Hazare movement, Aatish strongly advocates reactions against corruption. “To see a political awakening, to see people holding their government to task… that old mentality of mai baap sarkar falling away… that kind of outrage is a very good thing,” he states.

The 30-year-old young author is an avid Hindi film buff: “I watched Arakshan and liked the first half. The problem with Prakash Jha is that he does too much too early. So everything reaches the crescendo before the intermission and then the plot meanders.”

Although he loves Bollywood, he is critical of foreign films on India: “There’s a certain kind of cinema person who wants to make an upbeat film about misery like Slumdog Millionaire was. They think they’re being more interesting than Bollywood. I felt it was a bad film for India because India is cinematically able to deal with convulsions in its society and portray them in a way people understand. When someone contemplates on ‘mystical India’, it’s quite offensive to me because he is not bothered to know the story of the guy who’s serving him tea. It pisses me off!”