She is not just a beautiful author, she is also an author who is beautiful. Totally at ease answering our questions, comfortable as she ties up her tresses, the liberal voice from Pakistan that she is, she is an intellectual and someone who is genuinely seeking peace between her beloved country and India.
Her pedigree is impeccable. Benazir Bhutto for an aunt, Murtaza Bhutto her father and her grandfather the very charismatic Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Yet this bold and the elegant Fatima is an author in her own right – truly an individual to reckon with. She means it when she says that “violence can never be the solution. Peace is the only way out.” She recognises that the countries that were born out of each other, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh face more or less the same problems which can be easily dealt with if they care to help each other out. She can’t fathom why both India and Pakistan refuse to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty when so many countries have.
Yentha caught up with the 29 year old Fatima after she had just delivered the 6th Annual K C John Memorial Lecture at the 4th Kovalam Literary Fest. She authored the poetry 'Whispers of the Desert' (written when she was 13) '8.50 a.m., 8 October 2005' (the accounts of Pakistan earthquake victims) and the ‘Songs of Blood and Sword’, a daughter’s memoir (published in April 2010).
When asked whether the memoir was a daughter’s gesture of repaying her father, Fatima says, “It is actually my promise to my father. I gave him my word that I will write this. This is what my father asked of me just a few hours before he was killed. He cannot bring one out like this when he is alive, he said. He told me to write after he is gone. And that is the memoir.”
She is a Bhutto - the most popular political family from Pakistan. Was she compromised when introduced as the niece of Benazir Bhutto? “I am listened to and I receive a warm welcome wherever I go,” quite diplomatically giving the question a skip. She has seen four of her family members assassinated but she still lives in her home at Karachi. As a woman how secure and free does she feel especially in a conservative society like the one in Pakistan? Her reply was quick “Where in the world is a woman safe, for that matter? Women, being the minority, have to face their insecurities in whichever part of the world they live. The same applies to Pakistan too. But I don’t change for the sake of the society in which I live. I remain the way I am.” The turmoil has not deterred this lady from being the crusader for her homeland, if we can call her one.
Under the umbrella of the Kovalam Literary Fest, two authors stand out not only for their books but also for opening doors to their homelands - Basharat Peer for Kashmir through his ‘Curfewed Nights’ and Fatima Bhutto for Pakistan through her memoir ‘Songs of Blood and Sword’. To the question whether she could be considered as a goodwill ambassador of her country, she smiles “Living in Pakistan, I see a side of the country which people normally do not see. So I try to bring that side in front of the world.”
She intently listens to your words as the cameras capture her various moods. Obviously she is gifted with a lot of charisma but she has an excellent educational background. A BA degree in Middle Eastern Studies from Columbia University, New York and a Masters in South Asian Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London have made her dwell deeper into the socio-political as well as economic metamorphosis of not just her country but also countries around the world.
Basharat Peer talks about a new generation growing up in Kashmir ‘who have become far too intimate with war and fear’. Is the same happening in Pakistan? Fatima Bhutto nods, “What the youth see are the generals and today’s rulers. So there is a chance of the same happening there.” Pakistan is mired in controversies. But aren’t there people, alive, who are fit to guide Pakistan? She catches the pun quickly and pat comes her answer, “Sure, there are quite a few fascinating personalities in Pakistan, Muhammad Hussain for one.”
Fatima Bhutto
I just got time to thank this strong lady before Fatima was frisked away by the organizers. The room falls silent. An emptiness that seemed too serene to be ignored. I pick up my notepad and notice that I have hardly written a word. Words get imprinted in your heart sometimes that you hardly need to write anything. I wonder what impact her written words would have on me …
Source: http://www.yentha.com/news/view/4/13986
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