Knighthood of Salman Rushdie All other aspects were for the main committee to examine. The British Foreign Office, which has a permanent secretary on the main committee, announced that there had been no requests to gauge possible Muslim reaction to the knighthood. It was noted that Rushdie's 13 books have won numerous awards, including the Booker Prize for "Midnight's Children" in 1981, the Booker of Bookers prize, the Whitbread novel award (twice), and the James Tait Black memorial prize. PEN International had been a constant supporter of Rushdie being honoured, believing that awarding the author (born in India) would be "seen as a positive
Salman Rushdie the late 19th century. Rushdie called for a reform in Islam in a guest opinion piece printed in "The Washington Post" and "The Times" in mid-August 2005: Rushdie is a critic of cultural relativism. He favours calling things by their true names and constantly argues about what is wrong and what is right. In an interview with Point of Inquiry in 2006 he described his view as follows: Rushdie is an advocate of religious satire. He condemned the Charlie Hebdo shooting and defended comedic criticism of religions in a comment originally posted on English PEN where he called religions a