Shashi Tharoor would never kill my mother: Sunanda's son Shiv

The son of Sunanda Pushkar, Shiv Menon has sent a letter to the media, denying that his mother would have committed suicide and adding that Shashi Tharoor would never have killed her.

Menon said that he had been compelled to speak out because he had been ‘devastated’ by the news coverage around the death of his mother.

“Anyone who knew my mother would know she was simply too strong to commit suicide”, the letter said, adding that “I also do not believe that Shashi was capable of physically harming her let alone take her life”.

Menon’s statement comes even as the Sub Divisional Magistrate probing Pushkar’s death called for further investigations into the incident.

In the report, the SDM said that the relationship between Pushkar and her husband were strained. Also the report suggests that more investigation is needed to find out if there was any abetment to her death, which could be a suicide.

Meanwhile, the report suggests that Pushkar died of a drug poisoning due to overdose. CNN-IBN reports that the nature of the poisoning, which will define whether it was a suicide or homicide, will only be certain once the viscera report comes in. For now the police will have to further investigate the case and may have to register a case if they suspect foul play.

Apart from three major injuries on her wrist, chin and neck, doctors at AIIMS claim that she had more than a dozen brazen scuffle marks on the upper part of her body.

The fallout from the report has caused Tharoor’s political rivals including the CPI(M) and the Kerala BJP to call for his resignation.

Holding that Tharoor should own “moral responsibility” for the death of Sunanda, BJP state president V Muraleedharan said his continuation in the ministry also “posed a threat to the national security” since his late wife had alleged her husband had links with a Pakistani journalist with ISI connections.

One day before her death, Sunanda Pushkar went on a now infamous Twitter rant, using Tharoor’s Twitter account to broadcast messages that Pakistani columnist Mehr Tarar had purportedly sent the union minister, professing intense feelings for him.

Pushkar later went on to call Tarar an ISI agent and accused her of hacking into her computer, and also trying to break her marriage. She added that Taroor ‘being a man’ had been ‘flattered’ by the attention. However, emails since leaked to Headlines Today suggest that there was no affair, though Tarar’s relationship with Tharoor troubled Sunanda, who asked him to break all contact with the journalist.

While the Twitter spat that preceded Sunanda Pushkar’s tragic demise is well known, reports today hinted that all had not been well between her and husband well before the incident blew up on the micro-blogging site.

The Times of India in a report said that the couple had a ‘flaming row’ aboard a flight from Thiruvananthapuram on 15 January, despite the presence of Tharoor’s ministerial colleague Manish Tewari aboard the flight, and it continued well after they had landed at the Delhi airport. ( Read more )

The Congress party has stood behind Tharoor however, naming him as one of its official party spokespersons.