Thrust into the limelight after she married Congress politician Shashi Tharoor, Sunanda enjoyed much media attention, social adulation and political company before she mysteriously died in a suite of Hotel Leela Palace in New Delhi four years ago. Tharoor, who has been granted anticipatory bail for her murder, dismissed the allegation in a tweet by calling it ‘preposterous’. While the wheels of justice will take its own time before the killer is unveiled in this hi –society-whodunnit, here are a few things to know about Sunanda Pushkar.
The lady had a great sense of humour. Soon after her marriage to Tharoor post a whirlwind courtship, whenever asked whether she was apprehensive about marrying a politician and a person so different from herself, she would quip that it was the third marriage for both and neither could afford to not make it work. She would say that, a fourth would be too much and that they simply would have to ensure that it is ‘third time lucky’ for them…. Alas, it was not to be so for both.
Sunanda had a good sense of style and instinctively knew which outfit would work for which occasion. She liked wearing Indian outfits that were tailored for her and did not choose labels frivolously. She would freely share details about her ensembles and readily offer the services of her tailor whenever anyone gave her a compliment.
She bonded well with women journalists who were as old as she is and shared many details of her life with them. In the days preceding her death, she reached out to some of her close journalists and wanted to meet them and talk to them about issues that were troubling her. These issues were left unsaid since she died before she could articulate them.
Sunanda spent a lot of time in her husband Tharoor’s hometown and constituency, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala and the local people loved her. She was admired both for her beauty and her amiable nature wherever she went in the city. People were appreciative of the fact that though she was not from the state (Sunanda was a Kashmiri), yet understood their customs and even dressed like them often and attempted the local language, Malayalam. Almost every Malayali thought she rocked the Kasavu sari, gold jewellery and flowers- in- her- hair look at her wedding to Tharoor.
She was open about her own shortcomings and freely admitted that unlike her husband, she was not brilliant and made no pretence of the fact that she had not read any of Tharoor’s erudite books. She often said that she was in awe of Tharoor huge academic and intellectual prowess!
