Drop Kochi or die: D-gang's message to Tharoor aide

Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor today said he had received a death threat from the Dubai-based Dawood Ibrahim gang on his aide’s mobile phone. The brief message was: “Drop Kochi or die”.

Soon after, the Home Ministry stepped up his security and initiated an enquiry into the veracity of the threat. Central security agencies said the message came from a Delhi phone number.

Jacob Joseph, Officer on Special Duty with the minister, alleged the henchmen of Dawood Ibrahim had sent the threat message.

The standoff between Tharoor and Indian Premier League (IPL) commissioner Lalit Modi over the Kochi franchise has snowballed into a controversy with both parties trading allegations and counter allegations against each other.

While a public public interest suit was filed before the Supreme Court seeking a CBI probe into Tharoor’s alleged proxy stakes in the Rs 1,533-crore Kochi franchise of the IPL, supporters of the minister questioned Modi’s own financial and other credentials.

The case in the Supreme Court is likely to come up as a special leave petition on Thursday.

Tharoor’s supporters suggested the government had enquired into Modi’s Manipur-based online lottery business and on the basis of the report had refused Intelligence Bureau clearance to represent Iceland as honorary consul. His interests in a Singapore company and Hyderabad-based air charter firm also came in for criticism.

While welcoming Modi’s announcement that details of all IPL franchises would be made public, they asked for immediate release of information of two teams – Rajasthan Royals and King’s XI Punjab – backed by individuals who had their companies registered in Mauritius.

Sunanda Pushkar — dragged into the controversy due to her proximity to the minister — issued a statement vehemently denying her role as a proxy to Tharoor.

Pushkar said media reports questioning her stake in the Kochi franchise were biased. She said the reports ignored her professional background and international business experience and instead focused “obsessively on my personal life, as if a woman cannot be capable of professional or financial success”.

“My own business interests and assets are substantial, and efforts to besmirch Tharoor by presenting me as a proxy for him are personally insulting for me, as a woman and as a friend. I have built up a respectable and successful career, while coping with widowhood and raising a child as a single mother. Yet, I have been reduced to a caricature in the media, portrayed with inaccuracies and falsehoods,” she said.

Pushkar said she was forced to issue a statement “to set the record straight about my role in the public controversy surrounding the Kerala IPL Team franchise”.

She said team owners Rendezvous Sports World approached her last year “inviting me to associate myself with them as a consultant in their various sporting activities and particularly in their potential bid to acquire the franchise of an IPL team”.

“I had previously been approached by Karim Morani of Kolkata Knight Riders to join them in a similar capacity and had regretted that the timing was not convenient for me. In view of my extensive international experience as a business executive, marketing manager and entrepreneur, I was invited to assist Rendezvous, particularly in the areas of fund-raising, networking, event management and brand building.”

“Because this is a start-up effort, I was told that in lieu of a salary they would grant me minor equity in Rendezvous in return for my efforts — which is a common practice across the world for start-ups and projects of this nature. I should stress that I have accepted no salary or expenses and am conscious that the equity remains only on paper for the foreseeable future. However, with the equity comes an opportunity to participate in the management and promotion of Rendezvous and in particular of its IPL team, a challenge I welcome,” she added.

Pushkar also asked the media tp repect her privacy. “I have lived a life of integrity and committed no crime, yet I am treated in a humiliating manner. My parents, friends and family members have been hounded by intrusive journalists. My personal life is nobody else’s business and if I have a marriage to announce, I will do it myself, rather than leave it to strangers. I would request the media to respect my privacy.”