Court seeks Delhi Police reply on Tharoor's plea in Sunanda Pushkar case

A Delhi court on Monday issued notice to Delhi Police on Congress MP Shashi Tharoor's application seeking to preserve the Twitter account and tweets of his late wife Sunanda Pushkar.

The Twitter account of Pushkar, who was found dead in a suite of a luxury hotel in the city on the night of January 17, 2014, has been inactive since then.

Addition Sessions Judge Ajay Kumar Kuhar sought Delhi Police reply and listed the matter for hearing on March 20.

"Let the police file a reply. Put up the matter for March 20," he said.

Senior advocate Vikas Pahwa, while moving an application on behalf of Tharoor, stated that Twitter may delete the entire account when a person dies unless an order is passed in this regard.

He said that it poses a threat of loss of the evidence in this case and sought that directions be issued to the investigation officer to write to Twitter India to preserve her account and tweets.

Earlier, the court had dismissed a plea filed by Tharoor seeking to incorporate the tweets of his wife -- Sunanda Pushkar -- before her death be put on record.

Tharoor, who is the sole accused in the case, had told the court that the Delhi police was trying to selectively place reliance on a some of Pushkar's tweets to claim the differences which allegedly led her to commit suicide, whereas the tweets show her positive frame of mind and the fact that she was quite optimistic about her relationship with him.

The former union minister, who is currently on bail in the case, was charged by Delhi Police under Sections 498-A (husband or relative of husband of a woman subjecting her to cruelty) and 306 (abetment of suicide) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

The court had on Saturday allowed Tharoor to travel to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), France and Norway between February and May 2020 as the lawmaker was granted bail on a condition that he had to seek prior permission before travelling abroad.