New Delhi: In the midst of her political opponents raking up the issue, a book claiming to "scrutinise" Congress President Sonia Gandhi's foreign origins was released in New Delhi today (Apr 9, 2004).

"'Sonia Under Scrutiny' examines the legal, political, social, constitutional and security implications of Gandhi becoming the Prime Minister of India," said A Surya Prakash, its editor and a senior journalist.

The book, published by India First Foundation, was released by M J Akbar, Editor-in-Chief of 'Asian Age', which carried yesterday (Apr 8, 2004) a signed article by Bofors investigator Sten Lindstrom in which the Swedish detective had sought among other things that Sonia Gandhi be questioned so that "truth" could come out about the pay-off in the gun deal.

Akbar, however, said his releasing the book had nothing to do with the publication of the article in his paper.

"I had agreed to release the book eight months ago," he said.

About the timing of the article, Akbar said, "the timing was chosen by the policeman (Lindstrom) who wanted to give the story."

JD-U (Janata Dal-United) leader Jaya Jaitley, who contributed one of the book's 10 chapters, said "Gandhi still has one leg in Italy as demonstrated by the fact that she still has property there."

S Gurumurthy, a journalist and another contributor, said Congress should answer why it took Gandhi 15 years to surrender her Italian passport.

"There are no records to show whether she has yet applied to give up Italian citizenship," he said.