In a return to self, Aatish Taseer maps pilgrimage, faith, exile and identity

“I had not arrived as a pilgrim to Copacabana but, in being someone who also had something to ask of life, I became one,” writes Aatish Taseer in his new book A Return to Self: Excursions in Exile. His framing of pilgrimage as a matter of happenstance rather than intention is beguiling because it invites the reader to consider what faith can look like when it is not an enclave of the routinely pious but available to anyone who seeks a resting place.

Born to a Sikh mother and a Muslim father, Taseer, who calls himself “a cultural Hindu”, paid his respects at the Basilica of Our Lady of Copacabana in Bolivia. At this shrine built to honour the Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ, Taseer asked for his unnamed novel to find a publisher. “My longtime publisher had sat on it for months before passing. I was mid-career. I was afraid of being put out of business,” he shares. When he was assured that the Virgin Mary would give him anything he wanted, he knew exactly what to ask for.

Haunting images

On another occasion, he spent the nights leading up to Ashura, described as “the climactic tenth day in a ritual period of mourning for the world’s more than 150 million Shiite Muslims”, in the holy city of Najaf in Iraq. He recalls a haunting image of a handsome, bearded man who “fell to his knees and sliced at his bleeding head with the two daggers he carried in his hands, as if he’d meant to scalp himself”. Taseer, who makes no secret of his own “Westernisation” in the book, seems to be pandering to the orientalist gaze here.

His accounts of both the pilgrimages mentioned above appear in a collection of his essays, which takes the reader on journeys to Turkey, Uzbekistan, Morocco, Spain, Mexico, Sri Lanka and Mongolia. These were first written for an American magazine.

While documenting the present and the past of each place, he also opens up about himself. In the chapter set in Istanbul, the author — who is now married to an American man — reflects on what it was like to live a closeted life when he “lacked the means to connect desire with love”. His words would strike a chord with many readers who have struggled with their sexual orientation.

During that time, Taseer was a regular at a hammam — a public bathhouse — where the men got “frisky” in the side rooms. He recalls the gratification, playfulness and laughter, but also feeling “wretched with guilt”, “afraid of disease”, and scared about his girlfriend finding out. It is courageous of him to talk about his internalised homophobia at the risk of sounding politically incorrect.

Homosexuality, after all, is still considered a Western import by a large number of people in India and Pakistan — the two countries that Taseer traces his heritage to. He was born in England, but his mother is an Indian, and his father is a Pakistani.

In India, where homosexuality is decriminalised, there is no legal recognition for same-sex marriage. In Pakistan, homosexuality is punishable by law, so marriage equality is out of the question.

Public mourning

Apart from being a travelogue, this book is also a public mourning. Taseer notes, “On November 7, 2019, the Government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi revoked my Overseas Citizenship of India, or OCI, effectively banning me from the country I grew up in.”

According to the Home Ministry’s statement, Taseer’s OCI card was revoked because he did not reveal the Pakistani origins of his father.

Taseer argues that the government’s decision was a response to his criticism of the Prime Minister in a cover story that he wrote for an American magazine.

Regardless of the reason, Taseer could not attend his grandmother’s funeral in India. The book captures his personal tragedy poignantly but loses out on making a larger point about how the visa regime keeps Indians and Pakistanis from visiting family members who live just across the border, even if they want to attend a wedding or a funeral.

The book also loses out on nuance in the Sri Lanka chapter while depicting the teaching of the Buddha as one that “did not need faith or devotion to be apprehended”.

Although the Buddha cautioned his students against superstition, he also spoke about the importance of developing confidence in the teacher as a foundational aspect of the spiritual path.

Saddha, the Pali equivalent of the Sanskrit ‘shraddha’, is usually translated as faith. What faith means in Buddhism, however, is certainly different from what it means in Abrahamic religions. The Buddha did not ask for unquestioning acceptance. He emphasised direct experience.