A controversial Bangladeshi writer, Taslima Nasreen, says she has asked the Indian authorities to grant her asylum.

Ms Nasreen, who is accused of blasphemy by Islamic radicals in Bangladesh, has been denied entry into the country by successive governments.

Talking to journalists on a visit to India, Taslima Nasreen said she was bored of living in the West for over a decade and would like to settle down permanently in Calcutta, the centre of India's Bengali community.

She said she needed a Bengali environment to let her creativity flourish.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service