Akshata Murty, daughter of Infosys founders Narayana Murty and Sudha Murty, married Sunak in 2009. Sunak became the youngest UK Prime Minister in October last year after seeing a quick rise in power.
Sudha Murty, UK PM Rishi Sunak’s mother-in-law, said that her daughter Akshata Murty was behind her husband’s success and made him the Prime Minister. In a viral video, Murty can be seen talking about her son-in-law and the role her daughter played in his political career in the UK.
Akshata Murty, daughter of Infosys founders Narayana Murty and Sudha Murty, married Sunak in 2009. Sunak became the youngest UK Prime Minister in October last year after seeing a quick rise in power.
Before becoming the prime minister, Sunak was the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Boris Johnson-led government from 2020 to 2022. Sunak joined the Conservative Party in 2010 and has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Richmond (Yorks) since 2015.
In the viral video, philanthropist Murty can be seen saying: “I made my husband a businessman. My daughter made her husband the Prime Minister of the UK. The reason is the glory of the wife. See how a wife can change a husband. But I could not change my husband. So, I made my husband a businessman, and my daughter made her husband a Prime Minister.”
In her clip, Murty also spoke about how religious Sunak is and how he observes a fast every Thursday.
“Our son-in-law, who married our daughter, has been in England for 150 years from their ancestor’s time, but they are very religious. After getting married, he asked why you start anything on Thursday. They said that we will go to Raghavendra Swami. He fasts every Thursday after just saying good day. Our son-in-law’s mother fasts every Monday but our son-in-law fasts on Thursdays,” she said.
Akshata, with an estimated net worth exceeding 700 million pounds, is one of the richest women in the UK and heiress to a fortune worth billions.
Earlier this week, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak landed into fresh trouble after a House of Commons probe into his wife’s financial interests deepened further. Sunak is being investigated over a potential breach of rules for failing to declare the financial interest of his wife, Akshata Murty, in a childcare firm — Koru Kids. The firm allegedly benefited from a policy change in last month’s budget.
The Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards was already probing whether Sunak declared the shares his wife holds in a business that was boosted by the Budget correctly. It has now been extended to cover Section 13 of the Code of Conduct for MPs.
Daniel Greenberg CB, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, expanded his probe to include whether PM Sunak also broke Section 13 of the Commons code, which forbids MPs from “disclosing details” of an investigation.
Downing Street, on its part, has said that all interests were “transparently declared”. It has clarified the nature of the inquiry related to his wife Akshata’s shares in Koru Kids, which could profit from the government’s expansion of free childcare places and sign-on cash being handed to new childminders.
No. 10 has said that Sunak had declared his wife’s shares to the Cabinet Office, which later appeared in last week’s publication of the ministers’ interests. Downing Street had maintained that Sunak, 42, followed the rules of ministerial conduct at all times and had declared his wife’s interests as a ministerial interest.