As an example of Naipaul’s prejudiced outlook, which is obviously at variance with generally accepted opinions, Dalrymple quoted Naipaul’s observation that the Taj Mahal was “so wasteful, so decadent, and in the end so cruel that it is painful to be there for very long. This is an extravagance that speaks of the blood of the people”.

The trashing of the Taj, which was seen as a “tear on the face of eternity” by Rabindranath Tagore, was in keeping with Naipaul’s condemnation of Muslim rule in India as a period of vandalism. Since this view is the same as that of the saffron brotherhood, it is not surprising that Naipaul and his wife graced the offices of the BJP on the eve of the 2004 general election.

Afterward, Lady Naipaul, whose Muslim background is now being emphasised following Girish Karnad’s criticism of the Mumbai award to her husband, had said that Sir Vidia was quite happy to be “appropriated” by the then ruling party. This, too, was not surprising given Naipaul’s approval of the Babri masjid destruction, which he saw as an example of Hindu “pride”, as did the RSS. To Naipaul, the events in Ayodhya in December, 1992, was “a sort of passion”. Moreover, “any passion is to be encouraged. Passion leads to creativity”.

No one has ever asked Naipaul whether he also saw in the same light the burning of synagogues by the Nazis – the only occasion in modern times other than the Babri masjid demolition, and the burning of churches in Odisha, of the targeting of the places of worship of minorities. Arguably, the organizers of the Mumbai festival could have asked someone from the RSS to hand over the prize to Naipaul.

It is now being claimed that Naipaul cannot be anti-Muslim since his wife is one. It is possible that the man has changed, but in An Area of Darkness, he wrote: “At an early age, I understood that Muslims were somewhat more different than others” and that “they were not to be trusted; they would always do you down”.

It is this bias against an untrustworthy people, which made Naipaul describe Emperor Akbar, whose name is normally followed by the appellation, the Great, as “terrible”. Since his knowledge of Indian history seems to be derived mostly from RSS pamphlets, it is worth quoting Sir Jadunath Sarkar’s view of Akbar as a “genius, though unlettered and often hot-blooded”, at whose death “the progressive spirit died out of India”.

Naipaul’s dislike of Akbar is the result of his aversion to multiculturalism, which he called a “racket”. However, the unlettered and hot-blooded Emperor was credited by another historian, Abraham Eraly, as a visionary who saw the virtues of pluralism when he tried “to gather the diverse peoples of the subcontinent under his benevolent wings to enable them, through religious and cultural syncretism, to live in peace and amity. In this vision, and in his intellectual openness and rationalism, this sanguinary medieval autocrat was a thoroughly modern man, ahead of his time and in some ways, ahead even of our time”.

It isn’t only the Muslims who have earned Naipaul’s ire. He is no less averse to the blacks, with whom he spent his childhood and early youth in the West Indies. Yet, as Githa Hariharan points out in her article, ‘The Ignoble politics of Naipaul’s Nobel’, Naipaul mentioned only England as his “home”, and India as the “home of his ancestors” while receiving the Nobel prize. There was no mention of Trinidad, where he was born and grew up, and which was “the home of his most admired early works such as The Mystic Masseur, A House for Mr Biswas and Miguel Street.”

Perhaps the reason for the neglect lay in his perception of Trinidad as “unimportant, uncreative, cynical” and indifferent to “virtue as well as vice”. Or was it because Naipaul is an Uncle Tom, as Edward Said called him, “a despicable lackey of neo-colonialism and imperialism”? Or was it because of “a repulsion towards Negroes”, as the Caribbean poet, Derek Walcott, suspected? Incidentally, Walcott called him V.S. Nightfall.

The repulsion towards “Orientals” could also be seen in the way the people became “diminished and deformed” in his eyes as Uncle Tom moved from Europe to Asia or Africa on his travels, and in the way “they begged and whined”. And, as for Indians, “they defecate everywhere … they defecate, mostly, besides the railways tracks. But they also defecate on the beaches; they defecate on the hills; they defecate on the river banks; they defecate on the streets; they never look for cover”.(IPA Service)