New Delhi, April 11 
In a book that has sent ripples across the political establishment for its timing and content, Sanjaya Baru, media adviser to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in his first term, has said Congress president Sonia Gandhi slowly chipped away at the authority of the Prime Minister's Office, created a parallel power structure and left a weakened PM who "allowed himself to become an object of such ridicule in his second term in office."

In the book, 'The Accidental Prime Minister-The Making and Unmaking of Manmohan Singh', that hit the stands on Friday, Baru, who now works with a think tank, said so weak was Manmohan Singh that he also failed to defend his (Baru's) promised reappointment after the 2009 election victory as secretary in the PMO and tamely surrendered to the party's veto.

Baru, who spoke to Times Now news channel in the evening, also said there had been weakening of the office of prime minister in the coalition era.

He also said that it was widely known in the PMO that some decisions taken by the PM went through a pre-verification process to get Gandhi's verbal nod and this was done by the PM's principal secretary Pulok Chatterji, who was once her close aide.

In his book, Baru gave instances of Manmohan Singh capitulating to the extra-constitutional authority of Sonia and refusing to assert himself.

The BJP promptly reacted with a I-told-you-so, with party leader M. Venkaiah Naidu saying that "I have been saying from day one, PM presides, Madam decides."
Pankaj Pachauri, who is presently the communication adviser in the Prime Minister's Office, put out a statement saying: "It is an attempt to misuse a privileged position and access to high office to gain credibility and to apparently exploit it for commercial gain. — IANS