New Delhi/Jaipur, November 23
Virtually hounded out of Kolkata, controversial Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen was today packed off by Rajasthan police from a hotel in Jaipur and taken to Delhi after a day-long mystery about her exact whereabouts.

Nasreen stayed at a hotel in Jaipur last night and was hurriedly shifted from the Pink City by a posse of Rajasthan police and intelligence personnel to Delhi, where she was accompanied by officials of the Union Home Ministry and the Rajasthan government.

The Rajasthan government said in a press release late this evening that it was “left with no alternative except to have Nasreen as a guest of the Government of Rajasthan till such time the (Union) Ministry of Home Affairs takes a final view regarding her stay and security.”

Rajasthan's principal home secretary V.S. Singh said “she is our state guest. It is our responsibility to provide security. The location cannot be divulged due to security reasons.” Unconfirmed reports said the Bengali novelist, who is in self-exile in India, following death threats in Bangladesh after her allegedly anti-Islamic writings, was in Haryana's Gurgaon area, neighbouring Delhi.

Seeking the intervention of the Union Home Ministry, the Rajasthan government said it toyed with the idea of sending the writer back to Kolkata but the West Bengal government “simply refused to countenance this idea.” Nasreen was put on a flight to Jaipur yesterday by the West Bengal Police, following large-scale violence in Kolkata by a Muslim organisation demanding cancellation of her visa and expulsion to Bangladesh. — PTI