The organizers of the festival were placed in an impossibly difficult position. Let down as they were by the spineless Rajasthan government, who had eyes only for the Muslim vote in the current elections, they did their best. They were personally threatened by a baying mob of bearded youths who invaded the festival compound promising murder and mayhem if Rushdie was allowed so much as a video link (as Germaine Greer said at the time of the Danish cartoons row, "What these people really love and do best is pandemonium").
MORE: http://richarddawkins.net/articles/644796-it-s-part-of-their-culture-reading-nick-cohen-in-the-light-of-the-jaipur-affair
