I won't accuse, but I will put on record my silences in my autobiography: International Booker Prize winner Banu Mushtaq

New Indian Express

a day ago

Banu, Does writing get complicated after winning an award? How do you manage the pressure?
Banu Mushtaq: Awards bring joy, but also expectations. After the award, everything changed. There's a lot of travel. I lose my personal time, but I'm happy. I meet people who have fought alongside me from the beginning. Interacting with them gives me special energy.
I haven't written anything since winning the Booker. I don't recall writing anything recently, I've been too busy. But the award has given me confidence and encouragement. Writing remains a deeply private act, whether people are watching or not. And I'm happy about that.
Can you tell us about the first story you ever wrote? What made you write that first sentence?
Banu Mushtaq: I've been writing since childhood. I can't remember the first sentence now. In college, I wrote a story about a woman facing deep emotional tension due to her married life. She tried, she struggled, and ultimately died by suicide. I don't know why I wrote it — I had no personal experience of that. The story was titled Am I the Culprit? (Am I Apradhi?). Unfortunately, I didn't preserve it, but I remember it was published in Prajamata, a prominent Kannada weekly, and I can still recall the cover page.
You're working on your autobiography. How truthful can a memoir really be? Are there things you're determined to put on record?
Banu Mushtaq: People often say that writers don't tell the full truth in autobiographies. But I want to tell the truth, and truth is many-layered. There's the truth of events, and then the truth as conveyed through fiction. I cannot wear masks in my memoir. But even so, memory is a tricky alley.
What I'm determined to put on record now are the silences, the struggles of being a Muslim woman writer, the politics of literary spaces, the fierce joys, and quiet devastations that shaped me. This is not a confession; it's a witnessing. There will be no complaints, no accusations. But I want to bare my life. I want to say many things that have been layered within me.
In Heart Lamp, Mehrun is in despair and is eventually rescued by her daughter. It's a deeply intimate and haunting story, drawn from your own experience. How did you find the emotional distance to fictionalise such pain?
Banu Mushtaq: That story carries the scent of my wounds. To write it, I had to step aside and let Mehrun speak, not as me, but as someone with her own voice and despair. Distance didn't come easily. It came with time, tears, and trust in the healing power of fiction. It was cathartic, but not sentimental. I wanted the truth, sculpted through story.
I was very emotional. I once tried to end my life by pouring kerosene on myself. But Mehrun's story is different. She had no one. She was surrounded only by despair. In her marital and parental homes, no one supported her. She was drowning until her daughter, a minor, came to her rescue. In situations of conflict between parents, children often become wiser. Salma became an adult too early. She lost her childhood.
There's no black-and-white morality in your stories. For example, in The High-Heeled Shoe, Nayaz both loves and tortures his wife. Why do your women characters often endure so much?
Banu Mushtaq: What choice do they have? Patriarchy begins at home. Even if a woman leaves her husband, where will she go? Predators are everywhere, even at the workplace. She must earn, find shelter, and try to live with dignity. But even as a beggar or domestic worker, patriarchy haunts her.
If she returns to her mother's home, she might be turned away. If she finds work, her employer may exploit her. Patriarchy follows her everywhere, even in death. This is why she endures. This is how she protests in her own way.
I believe 50% of women would leave their partners if they had shelter. But they don't. Not even children are safe. In the womb itself, a girl child is aborted. There are posters in Rajasthan: "Spend ₹600 now, save ₹6 lakhs later." Misogyny begins before birth. Where should she go?
You began writing during the Bandaya Sahitya movement in Karnataka. How did that shape your writing, both in content and style? Do you still feel that spirit today?
Banu Mushtaq: Absolutely. Bandaya gave me permission to be angry in Kannada. It allowed me to disrupt, to write. I was one of the few Muslim women in that space. It was liberating but isolating. There was a fire, a solidarity with others who burned with questions. Bandaya made me brave.
That spirit still burns in my writing quieter now, more precise. Bandaya is a lens, a way to perceive and internalize the world. Its slogan — Hudga aagali, kavya haadga aagali! (Let this sword become a poem) is deeply humane. It doesn't ask the sword to cut, but to unite. That gave me the strength to use my craft with purpose.
In a recent event, someone asked why your stories focus mostly on the Muslim community. Why haven't we seen more representation of others?
Banu Mushtaq: Bandaya aimed to challenge caste, gender, economic oppression. But after the Babri Masjid demolition, my focus shifted. I began asking questions about the demonisation of Muslims, denial of rights, and treatment as second-class citizens. These themes emerged in my later work.
In Heart Lamp, my first collection, such stories aren't included. But I've written over 60 stories in six collections. Only 12 were selected for Heart Lamp. In my second collection, which is currently being translated, you'll see characters from diverse communities and broader themes.
In Red Lungi, you explore class in subtle ways — like the contrast in how rich and poor boys undergo circumcision. There's also a Hindu doctor performing the procedure. Was that intentional?
Banu Mushtaq: Of course. Surgery has no religion. Muslims don't insist on a Muslim doctor for medical procedures, we go to the best available doctor. Whether it's for a cold or for circumcision, what matters is care, not religion.
What do you hope your stories will mean to the next generation of women who are writing, resisting, and trying to be heard?
Banu Mushtaq: Wherever patriarchy exists, my stories are reaching there and resonating. The Booker jury said these stories are relevant because they have universality. These aren't just issues of Muslim women. They are the struggles of all women, poor, marginalised, oppressed by patriarchy.
As long as patriarchy exists, my stories will be heard, discussed, cherished, and they will haunt readers. I'm certain of that.