eteran journalist Nalini Singh supported the theory of Sunanda Pushkar's "unnatural" death by saying that Shahi Tharoor's wife had been devastated over the relationship she believed her husband was having with Pakistan journalist Mehr Tarar. In an exclusive interview, she claimed that Pushkar was disturbed and crying hard barely hours before her death.

The television journalist was the last person Sunanda called from her mobile phone hours before she died on 17 January in a five-star hotel room. When asked whether she realised Sunanda made her last call to her, Singh said, "Not at all. I just knew that she was extremely upset. She sounded devastated. But I didn't think it could be her last call."

She said, "I have the knowledge that she was disturbed, as just two days back there were all kinds of messages on Twitter. By the time she called me she was very upset about this. I knew that I was talking to a very disturbed person, but there is no way I could imagine that this human being was using the last few minutes of her time."

Sunanda spoke about Tarar's alleged proximity with her husband. However, Singh told her that she might be imagining things: "I told her rather bluntly that it may be the case that she was imagining things about them. However, it is important for me to say that she spoke to me about Tarar six months ago and had asked me to find out about her."

Sunanda had stated that her husband and the Pakistan journalist were very close and had spent time together in Dubai while she was in India. "I can say that she was dejected in her marriage with Shashi Tharoor," Singh said.

The TV journalist said that her conversation with Sunanda was very "delicate" and that she did not mince words. "She was very angry with Shashi Tharoor and angrier with Tarar. I think she was not letting him off the hook. I would not like to harp on things as Tharoor is going through a tough time. But responsibly speaking, she said many things that depicted an insecure relationship with her husband. She had called me to vent her feelings."

Sunanda also asked Singh's help to retrieve the BlackBerry messages that Shashi Tharoor had deleted from his phone. "She said that you have to retrieve them for me... I said that how will I get Shashi's phone, to which she replied that she will manage it."

During the conversation itself, Singh said, somebody had called Sunanda saying "Saab". "For a moment I wondered who it could be at this hour of the night. Also, who she could possibly be speaking to in Hindi at a five-star hotel? So I asked if I should put the phone down. But she asked me to carry on saying that she had just asked for Shashi and that he would be there in two minutes."

Singh also revealed that for a brief second Sunanda also mentioned "IPL".

"I took to it when she said IPL. When I asked what about it, there was a long silence," Singh said.

"Sunanda was quite a public persona. She had great friends. She was an intelligent woman who had an ambition to outshine everyone else. She was on a rugged terrain. She would get very upset but would also calm down. One very important fact I feel I should say here is that I don't think she had a stomach for a secret," said the senior journalist.