BANGALORE, INDIA: Microblogging site Twitter seems to be a bad omen for India's Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor, who fell into the microblogging soup on more than one occasions. And the latest soup is not tweeted by Tharoor himself, but IPL commissioner Lalit Modi, who made a sensational comment on the mystery pertaining to the share holders of Kochi IPL team, and, of course, the mystery woman behind!
"Who are the shareholders of Rendezvous? And why have they been given this 100s of million dollar bonanza?" he said in a tweet. Modi had also mentioned the name of Sunanda Pushkar, a Dubai-based business woman who is allegedly linked to Tharoor, which further ignited the matter. News is that she is going to be Tharoor's third wife!
Modi also tweeted the details of the stakeholders in the new Kochi team which is to join the next year's edition.
The team that was last month sold for Rs 1530 crore has Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor's close friend Sunanda Pushkar owning 18 per cent free equity, a report in NDTV said, citing Modi's tweet.
Rendezvous Sports World, one of the partners in the consortium, has 25 per cent of the franchise for free. Of this 18 per cent is given to Sunanda and the balance is divided among three other Rendezvous members.
Modi said in the tweet that he was asked not to get into who owns the Rendezvous. "I was told by him (Tharoor) not to get into who owns rendezvous. Specially Sunanda Pushkar. Why? The same has been minuted in my records," he tweeted.
Meanwhile Tharoor released a press statement on twitter seeking to clarify his stand on the issue, saying that “I've had enough”.
The statement said, “A consortium led by Rendezvous was set up to bid for an IPL team. They approached me for help and guidance. I steered them towards Kerala. Rendezvous includes a number of people, including many I have never met, and Sunanda Pushkar, whom I know well.”
Tharoor accused Modi of trying to delay the approval of the franchise without any proper reason. “Various attempts were made by Modi and others to pressure the consortium members to abandon their bid in favour of another city in a different state. Modi raised assorted objections to the bid documents but finally had no choice but to approve them.”
Modi's had alleged that Tharoor had called him during his meeting with investors in the Kochi consortium in Bangalore on Saturday night in order to press him not to question the composition of the consortium.
Denying this charge, Tharoor said, “I called Modi to ask why he was further delaying the approval of the franchise when all the legal requirements had been fulfilled. Had he conducted himself in good faith throughout, no call would have been necessary.”
“Whatever my personal relationships with any of the consortium members, I do not intend to benefit in any way financially from my association with the team now or at a later stage,” he added.
Now the latest is that Rendezvous is planning to sue Modi for breaking the confidentiality terms.