Minister’s wife takes to Twitter over alleged affair

The jealous wife of an Indian minister admitted to hacking into her husband’s Twitter account and sending messages exposing his alleged affair with a Pakistani journalist.

Human resources minister Shashi Tharoor’s wife, Ms Sunanda Pushkarna, claimed on Twitter that she was posting intimate messages sent to her husband by Lahore-based Mehar Tarar, to show the world how she was “stalking her husband”.

“Our accounts have not been hacked and I have been sending out these tweets,” Ms Pushkarna told a newspaper on Wednesday. The scandal was featured on the front pages of several Indian newspapers after a series of messages appeared on the Twitter account of Mr Tharoor.

"That woman (Pakistani) pursued and pursued him (Tharoor) ... men are stupid anyway ... for all you know she is a Pakistani agent(spy). Where's love, where's loyalty in this world? I am so distraught," she was quoted as telling the Indian Express newspaper.

Ms Pushkarna, who married the 57-year-old junior minister in 2010 after a whirlwind romance, said she “felt destroyed as a wife and a woman” over her husband’s “rip-roaring affair” with the 45-year-old journalist.

Late on Wednesday night, however, Mr Tharoor posted a message to his two million Twitter followers claiming his account had been “hacked”.

And in a damage-limitation move aimed at stemming the scandal, he took to Twitter once again yesterday and posted a joint message on his account.

“We wish to stress that we are happily married and intend to remain that way,” he wrote.

“Sunanda has been ill and hospitalised this week and is seeking to rest. We would be grateful if the media respects our privacy,” the minister declared.

Ms Pushkarna also relented and yesterday tweeted that “Shashi an & I are very happy together”.

Ms Tarar also joined the Twitter battle, accusing Ms Pushkarna of being “out of her mind” and strongly objecting to being called an intelligence agent and a stalker.

“For a woman to trash another woman linking her w/her husband is the lowest form of sickness ever. It’s nauseous. No respect for her marriage” she tweeted.