File photo of Mehr Tarar, a Pakistani journalist
Pakistani journalist Mehr Tarar has asserted that she had no role in the marital discord between union minister Shashi Tharoor and his wife, Sunanda Pushkar, who was found dead in a five-star hotel on Friday evening.
Ms Tarar, whom Mrs Tharoor had accused of having an affair with her husband and then of "stalking" him, told a Pakistani TV channel last night that she is a "victim of conspiracy".
Ms Tarar, a 45-year-old Lahore-based journalist, has changed her profile picture on Twitter to a candle following Mrs Tharoor's death on Friday.
She said she had met Mr Tharoor twice -- once in India in April and then in Dubai in June last year. "There were a lot of people present there," she said.
"When I wrote an article that mentioned him, his wife probably did not like that another woman whom she did not know praised him so much. So she asked him to stop talking to me. Despite that he (Tharoor) kept following me on Twitter after which she said stop following her (Tarar) on Twitter.
"I don't know why she had a problem about me talking to her husband over phone or email. The talks I had with him is something that I can talk with anyone and anywhere in the world," she said.
Ms Tarar, the mother of a 13-year-old boy, also said, "Have you googled? You will find that problems emerged in their marriage since May and June. I was not involved in their life. At that time, she didn't know me nor was she blaming me for anything.
"Google their names and you will see what will appear. 'Marriage is about to break'. 'Trouble in paradise'. 'Fairytale is over'. News has been appearing about their marriage for long. A Pakistani woman sitting here cannot spoil their marriage," she said.
Ms Tarar claimed that Sunanda Pushkar first attacked her after she interviewed Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah.
"She (Pushkar) tweeted saying why has our CM spoken to a Pakistani journalist. First Pakistan sends Army and then sends journalist. She started fighting with me," Ms Tarar said.
She suggested Mrs Tharoor's illness had aggravated the situation. "She has not been well for a long time. Some Indian Union Minister also said she was seriously ill. Her husband and his office have said she had been on medication for the last three days.
"She was not eating. She was smoking too much. She also had stomach TB. This is not what I am saying but what has appeared in Indian media. If she fights with her husband and later her health gets affected, what is the connection of the love story about me," the journalist said.
52-year-old Sunanda was found dead at the Leela hotel in New Delhi. A post mortem report has said that Mrs Tharoor had a "sudden, unnatural death". Two days before she died she had alleged that her husband was having an affair with a Pakistani journalist, who she targeted in a series of angry tweets.