Hurree Babu reports from the Jaipur Literature festival. Was it Rushdie who said that literature in Indian languages was dead?

It was “local” readers who turned out in huge numbers for authors like Bhanu Bharti and Sheen Kaaf Nizam. It’s true that some of the people who packed the hall for Sheen Kaaf Nizam’s reading were there to keep their seats in anticipation of Rushdie’s reading, which was on next, but as one of the organisers told me, “He is one of our best poets. People have come from Jodhpur and Udaipur just to hear him.” I met one of Nizam’s fans, quietly exiting the hall instead of waiting for Rushdie’s reading: “After this poetry,” the gentleman said, “I have no appetite for prose.”