The only way to find out why someone decides to engage in armed combat is to look at their individual personality.

I was very happy in Bombay. I was good at school. There was no reason to change anything. I suppose it must have been some spirit of adventure, of wanting to see the world.

If I had simply wanted to trade on an insult to Islam, I could have done it in a sentence rather than writing a 250,000-word novel, a work of fiction.

Once you put a thought into the world, it can be disagreed with, but it can't be unthought.

Religion, a mediaeval form of unreason, when combined with modern weaponry becomes a real threat to our freedoms.

A mature society understands that at the heart of democracy is argument.

This is going to make me sound ancient, but I remember Juhu Beach when there weren't any buildings on it. You'd go through countryside and arrive at this amazing beach. I remember driving from Delhi to the Qutab Minar through countryside. Mehrauli was a little village - that's all gone.