Violent protests by thousands of Muslims led to Nasreen first being ushered out of riot-hit Kolkata city late last week.

Police in the West Bengal capital put her on a flight to Jaipur, but the local Rajasthan government there also told her to leave.

“She arrived here without informing us. Because of security reasons, the government has asked her to leave,” Rajasthan’s home minister Gulab Chand Kataria told reporters.

 
The 45-year-old feminist author, also a physician, is now believed to be staying at a guesthouse outside New Delhi. “We have yet to decide on where to house her. We are assessing the situation in Kolkata and there is a possibility that she can return there once matters become calm,” said highly-placed intelligence sources.

“For obvious reasons we cannot name the place she is staying. She is slightly depressed by the turn of events in Kolkata but otherwise she is fine,” the sources said.
Earlier last week, police in Calcutta used tear gas and baton charges to control crowds calling for her Indian visa to be cancelled. Rioters blocked roads and set cars alight. At least 43 people were hurt. More than 100 arrests were made. Critics say she called for the Koran to be changed to give women greater rights, something she denies.

“I am mentally distressed. I am not well at all,” Nasreen told local media by telephone. “I am not in a position to talk. I am shattered,” said the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize nominee and outspoken critic of Islamic fundamentalism.
“I have no place to go. India is my home, and I would like to keep living in this country till I die.”

Nasreen applied unsuccessfully in 2005 for Indian citizenship. “If they expel me from a liberal and democratic country (like India), I will never be able to live on the subcontinent,” Nasreen wrote to a French group, the Women’s Alliance for Democracy, last month.

Media reports said New Delhi has extended her Indian visitor’s visa, which was due to expire in March 2008.