Im the Dim to Gaddafi, Imran gets a walloping

Back in the day, when he was a playboy in London, the most common nickname for him was Im the Dim Salman Rushdie about cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan in a speech on Saturday in India

Salman Rushdie made a passionate call for Indias citizens to fight to protect free speech in New Delhi on Saturday night. People here are asleep, very much asleep, and you need to wake up, he said to hundreds of prominent businessmen, politicians and intellectuals.

You keep the freedoms you fight for and you lose those you neglect, he said.

But his speech may well be best remembered for its virtual evisceration of Imran Khan, the cricketer turned politician who has tried to position himself as the face of moderate, modern Pakistan.

Imran declined to attend the Saturday event, an annual conference sponsored by the India Today publishing group, citing the immeasurable hurt that Rushdies writings have caused Muslims around the world. Imran was to be the keynote speaker at the event, and when he pulled out Rushdie was elevated to the top spot.

Rushdie said he would try to put the term immeasurable hurt in the context of the real world for Imran.

Immeasurable hurt is caused to the Muslim community by terrorists based in Pakistan who act in the name of Islam, he said. Immeasurable hurt is caused to the Muslim community by Osama bin Laden finding shelter in Pakistan, and by a recent survey that showed that 80 per cent of Pakistanis see Osama bin Laden as a hero, he said. Immeasurable hurt is caused to the community by the enormous economic hardships and lack of education that result from mullah-driven politics, he said.

Imran Khan would do well to talk about the immeasurable hurt caused by these things, Rushdie said, rather than creating a bogeyman out of him.

Rushdie is becoming a sort of totemic figure for Indias appetite for and protection of free speech, since he was forced to cancel a scheduled appearance at the Jaipur Literature Festival earlier this year in the face of death threats and protests. Muslim leaders spoke against his scheduled appearance in Old Delhi on Friday, but there were no protesters outside the Taj Palace hotel, where Saturdays speech was held.

Rushdies appearance at the conference caused several scheduled speakers, including prominent politicians, to pull out. Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee and the newly elected chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Singh Yadav, who has portrayed himself as a modern, forward-thinking leader, were among the no-shows.

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Im the Dim to Gaddafi, Imran gets a walloping