Glad to be kept out of 'chewing gum' row: Chidambaram

Home Minister P Chidambaram says is happy that he was kept out of the 'chewing gum' controversy that rocked the North Block office of Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

"First of all, nobody has come to any conclusion that it was a chewing gum or anything else. I was happy I was kept out of the loop. Otherwise I would be accused of quote, unquote by a section of doctoring the report. I was quite happy on being kept out of the loop," he said.

He was responding to a question on the controversy of the alleged snooping of the offices of Mukherjee and his aides in the North Block in September 2010 and that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had said that Chidambaram was not informed about his direction to IB to conduct a probe into it on a "need-to-know" basis.

"Certainly not," Chidambaram shot back when asked whether the controversy has affected his relationship with Mukherjee.

Asked whether he shared a cordial and happy relationship with him, he said, "Well, you count the number of times we talk to each other."

Chidambaram said media has to invent ghosts that don't exist.