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THE SOUTH ASIAN Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) is an organisation remarkable for the lack of cooperation its members demonstrate: anyone who has tried to travel between the countries of the region knows that all too well. This lack of cooperation is a symptom of the wound left by partition, still festering after 60 years, and the smaller countries’ fear of domination by their mighty neighbour India. Pakistani and Bangladeshi politicians go to great lengths to deny that they have anything in common with India.

But, unlike their political counterparts, South Asian writers are keen to bridge boundaries. In Delhi, at a recent conference organised by SAARC, authors from across the region proposed attempting to establish a common identity. In London, Asian writers – including Kiran Desai and Gautam Malkani – will gather this month to discuss this and other issues at the first Asia House Festival of Asian Literature, supported by The Times.

The Bangladeshi writer Tahmima Anam, who lives in London, told me that the forging of a common South Asian literary identity might help to prevent writing from the smaller countries being overshadowed by India. The establishment of a South Asian Booker Prize on the lines of the Caine Prize for African Writing, Anam suggests, would be a step in the right direction.

Her novel The Golden Age is about the Pakistan Army’s brutal attempt to prevent the eastern half of the country breaking away. Noor, a novel by the Pakistani Sorayya Khan, has been described as “breaking the long tacit silence among Pakistanis of all hues about the horrors of what they saw and did in East Pakistan”. The maturity of these novels suggests that it is time for South Asian writers to play a part in preventing the past souring the present by establishing a common character and purpose.

But the towering presence of India will still create problems. It has the largest and most sophisticated book market and publishing industry. Apart from big Indian publishers such as Rupa, three multinationals have set up shop there – Penguin, HarperCollins, and Random House. Oxford has a long history in India and Pakistan but in Bangladesh publishing can only be described as rudimentary, while a Sri Lankan professor of English, Dr Walter Perera, has described his country as “lacking a proper publishing culture”.

An underdeveloped publishing industry does not just mean fewer books; it also means that those that are published are often not as well written as they could be. Dr Perera says that Sri Lanka does not have enough editors to help authors to improve their work. The result is that Indian books get into countries like Bangladesh, but living in India, I can say that we don’t hear much about our neighbours’ writing.

Some of the finest South Asian writing is in local languages which have much deeper roots in the region than English. But English gives writers a glo-bal readership. So inevitably there was also a call at the conference for the development of translation. For many years translation in India was restricted to classics such as the works of Rab-indranath Tagore. But Penguin has had considerable success with translations such as Sunil Gangopadhyay’s Those Daysand First Light, epic novels about the Bengal Renaissance of the 19th and early 20th century.

One of the stars of this year’s Jaipur Literary Festival was Baby Haldar, a domestic servant whose novel A Life Less Ordinary was translated and published by the small but adventurous Zubaan. Haldar attracted as much attention as writers such as Salman Rushdie and Kiran Desai. Niaz Zaman, a Bangladeshi professor of English, feels so strongly that her country deserves better publishing that she has become a publisher. One of the aims of her company, writers. ink, is to promote translation.

The international creation of a truly representative South Asian literary identity depends on translations. For writing about the partition of India it is hard to beat the Urdu short stories of the Pakistani Saadat Hasan Manto. I have never come across a more perceptive and entertaining account of life in an Indian village than the Hindi novel Raag Darbariby Shri-lal Shukla. Tahmima Anam is going back to Bangladesh to look for Bengali writing about the struggle for liberation from Pakistan.

Namita Gokhale, head of publishing in languages other than English at Penguin India, is justified in saying “writing in Indian languages is often more subtle, honed, and perceptive, than writing in English”. That’s not to deny the achievements of South Asians writing in English, but if the region’s identity is to be established authors must be allowed to come into their own – in their own voices.

India’s Unending Journey by Mark Tully, Ebury, £14.99

Buy the book here for the offer price of £13.49 inc p&p timesonline.co.uk/booksfirst

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Sir Mark Tully will talk about his new book at The Asia House Festival of Asian Literature on May 21 at 6.45pm. The festival runs from May 21-25 at Asia House, 63 New Cavendish Street, London W1G 7LP (www.asiahouse.org). To book call 020-7307 5454 or e-mail enquiries@asiahouse.co.uk.

Asia House is the “must visit” centre for everyone who has an interest in the rich and varied cultures of Asia. It is an independent charity supported primarily by subscriptions. Members enjoy a lively programme of events, with discussions, readings, film previews and music evenings.

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