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Journalism of Courage
Nobel Laureate V S Naipaul has not approached the Indian High Commission in London for a Person of Indian Origin (PIO) card,a spokeswoman of the mission said on Monday.
In a brief statement,the spokeswoman said: “Lady Nadira Naipaul had visited the High Commission some three months ago and made enquiries about the procedure for application for a PIO card for her husband which were explained to her by the concerned officials of the mission.
“These procedures are also on the High Commission’s website.”
She said: “no application has been made by V S Naipaul for a PIO card.”
Three months ago,Nadira travelled from Wiltshire to London to ask the Indian High Commission as to how her husband could apply for a PIO card that would entitle him to travel visa-free and even settle down in India in his last years
A media report quoted Nadira as saying that she was told that her husband should travel to Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh to find a tehsildar or magistrate willing to certify that Naipaul is indeed a person of Indian origin.
She also claimed that she was first made to wait in the “pits” of the embassy before being allowed to see an officer to whom she explained what she wanted.
Trinidad-born 78-year-old Naipaul,considered one of the masters of English writing,won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2001.
Naipaul has also received the Booker Prize,the John Llewllyn Rhys Prize,the Somerset Maugham Award,the Hawthornden Prize,the WH Smith Literary Award,and the David Cohen Prize.
