BHUBANESWAR: As people keep falling ill or even drop dead in the tribal pockets of undivided Koraput, the politics of mango kernel has come back to haunt the State. Both the government and the Congress have begun quibbling over facts and figures as the epidemic keeps spreading dangerously. Over the last few days, reports have been trickling out that tribals, as usual, have started taking to kernels and other wild tubers -- a reason for their increasing number of sickness. On Monday, it required Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik himself to refute these charges. He denied that consumption of uneatable, including mango kernel, by people in the backward KBK region has led to the outbreak of cholera and a large number of deaths. Naveen