India condemned the August 12 attack on Indian-origin author Salman Rushdie, calling it “horrific” on August 25, 2022. The statement by the Ministry of External Affairs, which was the first formal reaction by the government, came nearly two weeks after the stabbing of Mr. Rushdie at a public event in the United States by a man who was arrested for the hate crime.
“”India has always stood against violence and extremism. We condemn the horrific attack on Salman Rushdie and we wish him a speedy recovery,” External Affairs Ministry Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said at his weekly media briefing, in response to a question about the attack. Mr. Rushdie, who was stabbed repeatedly by a man identified as Hadi Matar, who admitted to attempting to murder him in response to Mr. Rushdie’s 1988 book the Satanic Verses, against which Iran’s former ‘Supreme Leader’ had issued a “fatwa” at the time.
Although condemnation of the attack on Mr. Rushdie had come in from across the world immediately after the incident at the Chataqua Institution in New York State, and several heads of state including UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, US President Joseph Biden, and leaders of the UK, France and other countries had issued strong statement, New Delhi had noticeably made no comment thus far.
