Meet Rishi Sunak: UK's First Non-White Prime Minister, A Practicing Hindu With Indian Roots

The man who has on Tuesday become the UK¡¯s 57th prime minister is richer than the King and, at 42, younger than every predecessor except William Pitt the Younger. Replacing his once leadership rival Liz Truss, Rishi Sunak is the first Indian-origin prime minister of the UK.

Here's everything that you should know about the former UK chancellor Rishi Sunak who gained the support of his party to bag the top post on Monday.

shutterstock

His youth

Sunak was born in Southampton in 1980 to Indian parents who had moved to the UK from east Africa. His father was a GP and his mother ran her own pharmacy. The eldest of three children, Sunak was educated at a private boarding school, Winchester College, which costs ?43,335 a year to attend. He was head boy, and has in recent years made multiple donations of over ?100,000 to the school.

Sunak went on to study politics, philosophy and economics at the University of Oxford. He was awarded a first-class degree. He later gained a master¡¯s of business administration (MBA) at Stanford University, where he met Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy¡¯s daughter Akshata Murty, his future wife.

His family

Murty, 42, is the daughter of the Indian billionaire NR Narayana Murthy, often described as the Bill Gates of India, who founded the software company Infosys. According to reports, his daughter has a 0.91% stake in the company, worth about ?700m.

The couple married in her home town of Bengaluru in a two-day ceremony in 2009 attended by 1,000 guests. They have two daughters, Krishna and Anoushka. In April this year it emerged that Murty was a non-domiciled UK resident, meaning she avoided UK taxes on her international earnings in return for paying an annual charge of ?30,000.

His career

Rishi Sunak became a member of Parliament (MP) in 2015 after he got elected from Richmond, Yorkshire. In February 2020, he was designated as the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the most important UK Cabinet post. Rishi Sunak was widely appreciated for his economic package for employees and businesses during the Covid pandemic.

AP

Sunak¡¯s path to the top wasn¡¯t all smooth. After losing to Liz Truss in a vote of Tory members on 5 September, he was expected to disappear from politics ¨C and quickly did, last speaking in the Commons the day after Truss became PM. But when Truss¡¯s disastrous and unfunded tax cuts brought her down in flames, Sunak was ready with the backing of supporters he had gathered over the summer campaign.

For more on news and current affairs from around the world please visit Indiatimes News.