THE CASE OF THE RECKLESS ROMEO - PART 2

In Part 1 of this story, I had dealt at length with the courtship and marriage of Sunanda Pushkar and Shashi Tharoor, which ended in her death under mysterious circumstances. Let us now delve deeper...

BJP leader Subramanian Swamy has levelled damaging charges against Congress MP Shashi Tharoor. He said, 'Tharoor is now a material witness. If he tells the truth he will not be made an accused, otherwise he will become an accused. I would urge him to tell the whole truth. The whole truth is that she was murdered by being administered poison. The room was prepared for the murder, Tharoor knows about it and tampered with evidence. Sunanda Pushkar had said she would expose the IPL deals. Tharoor is protecting somebody who actually was the person who would have lost a lot if Sunanda would have addressed a press conference.'

Which brings us to Sunanda and Shashi’s IPL connect, which dates back to their courtship days.

Shashi Tharoor was the public face of Cochin’s bid to win one of two IPL franchises created for the 2011 season. He described himself as a “mentor” in Cochin’s bid, in his role as a member of parliament from nearby Thiruvananthapuram. Against expectations, a consortium called Rendezvous Sports World Pvt Ltd won the auction with the highest bid, to secure the IPL franchise to promote Kochi Tuskers-Kerala in what is unquestionably one of the world’s most lucrative sporting tournaments.

However, the success turned sour when it was disclosed that Tharoor’s girlfriend, Sunanda Pushkar, was a member of the consortium. The diplomat-turned-politician was accused of benefiting personally from the deal and of failing to declare an interest.

The issue came out into the open  when the IPL Kochi team franchisee was issued an ultimatum by BCCI to clarify over the alleged 25 per cent stake sale of the team to "unknown buyers". The minister's name was dragged in when the then Chairman and Commissioner of the Indian Premium League, Lalit Modi revealed the names of some of the owners of the consortium that bought the franchisee (including Sunanda Pushkar). He also alleged that Tharoor had asked him to not to ask who the shareholders were.

Shashi Tharoor retaliated with a press statement which read, "A consortium led by Rendezvous was set up to bid for an IPL team. They approached me for help and guidance. I steered them towards Kerala. Rendezvous includes a number of people, including many I have never met, and Sunanda Pushkar, whom I know well. My role in mentoring the consortium included several conversations with Mr Lalit Modi, who guided us through the process and presented himself as a trusted friend." Besides trying to clear off his name from the controversy, the Congress minister alleged that "Lalit Modi and others had pressurised the consortium members to abandon their bid in favour of another city in a different state."

Accusing Lalit Modi of waging a campaign to “besmirch” the Cochin bid, Tharoor said : “I have neither invested nor received even a rupee for my mentorship of the team. Whatever my personal relationships with any of the consortium members, I do not intend to benefit in any way financially from my association with the team now or at a later stage.” He complained about reports relating to his girlfriend : “Our media cannot accept an attractive woman as a serious business professional. She has worked in brand management and her stake in the consortium had been given to her as sweat equity.”

The controversy cost Tharoor his job as a junior minister in the UPA government headed by Manmohan Singh. On September 19, 2011, the franchise of Kochi Tuskers-Kerala was terminated by the BCCI due to a breach in their contract terms, because they failed to provide a bank guarantee to cover their annual fee. According to IPL sources, substantial funding for Kochi Tuskers had been put in anonymously by Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law, Robert Vadra using Tharoor as the conduit. When the franchise was terminated, Vadra is believed to have asked Tharoor for his money back and Tharoor is reported to have pleaded helplessness in the matter. This had led to considerable unpleasantness between the two.

Days before her death, Sunanda Pushkar had used the Twitter route to make known to the world her apprehensions about her husband’s developing closeness to Pakistani journalist Mehr Tarar.

In a report published in The Economic Times, Pushkar was quoted as confirming that she had sent out the tweets. One of the tweets read: “Our accounts have not been hacked and I have been sending out these tweets. I cannot tolerate this (the closeness of Mehr Tarar and Shashi Tharoor??). This is a Pakistani woman who is an ISI (Inter Services Intelligence) agent, and she is stalking my husband. And you know how men are. He is flattered by the attention. I took upon myself the crimes of this man during IPL (Indian Premier League). I will not allow this to be done to me. I just can’t tolerate this. I have nothing more to say.”

The indication is that during the Kochi Tuskers misadventure, Shashi Tharoor had indulged in  misdemeanours, which she had covered up. After having stood up to him in those times, she was not prepared to accept the Reckless Romeo's philandering ways with the Pakistani journalist.

Sunanda had called anchor Rahul Kanwal of Headlines Today hours before her death and invited him over for a chat about the "other side of IPL". Similarly, she had also reached out to a senior Opposition politician and fixed up a meeting for the following week to tell him all about the IPL. She had also called up journalists Burkha Dutt and Nalini Singh. But none of these meetings happened because Sunanda died within hours of making these calls.

There are no eyewitnesses to her last living moments. So naturally, police investigations have to be based on circumstantial evidences and medical reports.The manner in which the initial investigations were done give an impression that someone with high connections wanted to close the case fast. The rules framed by the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi were flouted while constituting the autopsy panel. Instead of having three experts from three different institutions to do the post mortem, all the three members of the autopsy panel headed by Sudhir Kumar Gupta, professor and head of department forensic medicine -- Adarsh Kumar, assistant professor, and Shashank Pooniya, senior resident-- were from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences. The police were comfortable with the conclusion given out that Sunanda’s death could be suicide or accidental due to drug overdose.

But then skeletons started tumbling out. First there was the volte face by the autopsy panel head, Dr Sudhir Kumar Gupta, who alleged pressure from “higher ups”.

Thereafter, questions started being asked. And with the change of guard at the Centre, the pressure on the investigators has eased. There is now enough circumstantial evidence to negate the possibility that Pushkar’s death was due to suicide or even a drug overdose. And with the police registering “murder” as the cause of Sunanda Pushkar Tharoor’s death in the FIR filed rather belatedly on January 6, 2015, the line of inquiry is getting clearer.

The questions that are being asked are these :

·        What was Sunanda Pushkar intent upon confiding to several journalists and a senior politician hours before her death?

·        Was she done away because someone feared the consequences of her clearing her conscience?

·        Were her mobile calls being monitored? And, if so, by whom?

·        After ostensibly reaching a happy compromise in their personal relationship, why did husband Shashi Tharoor keep away from his wife till he came back to discover her dead body? Was he genuinely busy or was he keeping away on someone’s instructions?

·        With Sunanda’s personal doctors in Kerala denying that she was on any form of medication, were the strips of Alprax found in her room red herrings to veer the police and forensic experts to suicide or drug overdose?

·        How could the investigators have overlooked dead give-aways like tell-tale urine stains on bed linen and room carpet and a broken glass on the hotel table?

·        Current forensic evidence point to the fact that Sunanda was pinned down to her bed by atleast two burly men, while a third injected a poison into her. According to one of the doctors who did the autopsy, the prick marks on her hands are many, indicating that the murderer was inexpertly trying to locate a vein before plunging the syringe.

·        Could Sunanda’s murder be related to the IPL or to links in Dubai (where both she and Tharoor lived for a while), and the underworld there which controls illegal betting and match fixing in cricket?

·        Did she knew too much about the murky side of the IPL and threatened to expose those involved?

The questions are many. The answers, at the moment are few. But truth will come out one day. And the truth could be embarrassingly uncomfortable for many.

For another perspective of this murder mystery, you may also read :

http://t.co/TSxIiSw2Ka