Politician Shashi Tharoor Being Questioned by Delhi Police in Wife Sunanda's Murder Case

New Delhi: Congress leader Shashi Tharoor is being questioned as a witness by the Delhi Police at the Vasant Vihar Police Station about his wife's alleged murder.

Earlier this month, the police registered a murder case for Sunanda Pushkar, who was Mr Tharoor's third wife and was found dead in a five-star hotel in Delhi a year ago. Mr Tharoor recently reiterated what he described as his continuing cooperation, but said he has written to Delhi Police Chief about concerns about how the inquiry is being conducted.

The murder case mentions no suspect. Since it was registered on January 6, the police has questioned staff members and friends of Mr Tharoor and Ms Pushkar, who was 51 when she died.  

Mr Tharoor, 58, a parliamentarian from Kerala, said at a press conference last week that the investigation must be " free of political pressure or a pre-determined outcome."

In a letter to BS Bassi written in November, he had complained that his domestic helper had been beaten up during interrogation by policemen who sought a confession that he had killed Ms Pushkar along with the politician. The police chief has said Mr Tharoor's accusations of an attempt to frame him are baseless.

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Ms Pushkar was found dead in a hotel suite she had checked into after publicly accusing her husband of an affair with a Pakistani journalist. Mr Tharoor has said he is "stunned" by the police's inference that she was killed. For most of last year, Ms Pushkar's death had been debated as a suicide. The police say that a medical report submitted in December by doctors who conducted Ms Pushkar's autopsy establishes that she was poisoned.