Sir (Ahmed) Salman (sʌlˈmɑːn). born 1947, British writer, born in India, whose novels include Midnight's Children (1981), which won the Booker prize, Shame (1983), The Ground Beneath Her Feet (1998), and Shalimar the Clown (2005). His novel The Satanic Verses (1988) was regarded as blasphemous by many Muslims and he was forced into hiding (1989) when the Ayatollah Khomeini called for his death; knighted in 2007