Who is Rishi Sunak's wealthy wife Akshata Murty - and can she help his general election campaign?
The millionaire wife of Rishi Sunak, Akshata Murty, has brought some controversy to her husband's political career, but is also deployed as a way to soften and humanise him.
Wednesday 5 June 2024 18:00, UK
We rarely hear from Rishi Sunak's millionaire wife Akshata Murty. But the interests of the investor and businesswoman have made headlines throughout Mr Suank's career - and she has been quietly campaigning for him in the background.
Mr Sunak married Akshata - daughter of the so-called 'Bill Gates of India' Narayana Murthy - in 2009 after they met at Stanford University.
Their combined wealth is £651m, up from £529m in 2023, according to this year's Sunday Times's rich list - higher than the King's.
The majority of this comes from her 0.91% stake in her father's tech empire Infosys, alone worth around £590m.
The former fashion designer lives in London with Mr Sunak and their two daughters, but is still an Indian citizen.
In 2022 her earnings from her stake in Infosys threatened to derail her husband's PM leadership campaign.
Here Sky News takes a closer look at Akshata Murty, her family's wealth and how it has affected her husband's political career.
Daughter of the 'Bill Gates of India'
Akshata Murty was born in 1980 to parents Narayana and Sudha Murty in the southern Indian state of Karnataka.
A year later, in 1981, her father Narayana founded Infosys, the company that went on to make him one of the richest men in India.
After his master's degree in electrical engineering and one failed IT business, Mr Murthy borrowed 10,000 rupees (£100) from his wife to set up the new firm.
In a matter of years, Infosys had created a global delivery model for outsourcing IT services from India, making the company millions.
Mr Murthy served as CEO until 2002, when he took on the role of chairman, before stepping back to a role of chairman emeritus.
Forbes puts his net worth at $4.4bn (£3.4bn).
Met Rishi Sunak at Stanford
After finishing school in India, Akshata travelled to the US to study economics and French at the private Claremont McKenna College in California.
She then moved to Los Angeles to study design and merchandising at the Fashion Institute of Design.
After stints at firms including Deloitte and Unilever, she went to Stanford to study for an MBA.
It was there she met Rishi Sunak in 2005.
Four years later, they got married in a two-day ceremony in Bangalore, with a guest list including several of India's top cricketers.
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In their early years, Akshata founded her own fashion brand, Akshata Designs.
The pair share a "love of watching Friends reruns and eating Spanish food", according to an Instagram post.
They have two daughters, Krishna and Anoushka, and a red labrador called Nova.
But the dog ends up in spats with fellow Number 10 resident Larry the cat, she told Sky Kids' FYI show last year - and Larry tends to "come out on top".
The couple's combined stash of £651m eclipses that of King Charles's £610m, according to the 2024 Sunday Times Rich List.
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Row over financial interests
But their vast wealth has been the source of controversy.
It has prompted accusations the pair are out of touch with normal people's money struggles, amid what campaigners have called the "worst cost of living crisis in living memory".
As chancellor in 2022, Mr Sunak defended his record, saying he disagreed with the idea that "government can or should" compensate everybody for the resulting real-terms hit to their finances, especially when global factors such as the Ukraine war are at play.
Their financial status appeared to hinder his chances of becoming prime minister, initially losing out to Liz Truss, before succeeding her in October 2022.
That year it had emerged Akshata held "non-dom" tax status, meaning she did not have to pay UK tax on the millions she earned overseas.
The scheme is legal but Labour called it "breathtaking hypocrisy" for the wife of then chancellor Mr Sunak to reduce her tax bill, while he raised taxes for millions of workers.
She subsequently gave up her non-dom status, though her husband had defended it, telling the Sun: "Every single penny that she earns in the UK she pays UK taxes on... And every penny that she earns internationally, for example in India, she would pay the full taxes on that."
In this year's budget the government pledged to abolish the non-dom scheme, a headline policy long held by Labour.
Infosys was also criticised in 2022 for retaining operations in Russia, despite the UK, US and other Western allies unitedly pulling out in response to the war in Ukraine.
It later said it would pull out of Moscow.
Another row erupted in 2023 when it emerged Koru Kids, a childcare company in which she invested, was to benefit from new government childcare policy announced by her husband's government in that year's spring budget.
A later investigation found Mr Sunak's failure to properly declare her shareholding had been inadvertent, and Ms Murty later donated her shares in Koru Kids to charity.
She also last year would down her venture capital fund, Catamaran Ventures UK, following controversy over whether it would benefit from other government policies.
Campaigning for the Conservatives
Akshata has made careful appearances for her husband's party.
In an unusual move for the wife of a leader, last year she introduced her husband on to the stage at the Tory party conference in a surprise speech about her "best friend".
"He is fun, he is thoughtful, he is compassionate and has an incredible zest for life," she said in the personal and glowing address that seemed to go down pretty well.
Perhaps another attempt to humanise him, which had more of a mixed reaction, was a joint interview they gave Grazia on household chores.
They told the magazine that he re-stacked the dishwasher after her and loved making the bed - an interview slammed by some on social media as "bottom barrel" of "fresh hell".
One wrote on Instagram: "In a country where people can't afford their lighting bills somehow we're not actually interested in how a billionaire splits household chores."
Meanwhile she continues campaigning in the background, posting a photo of the couple out flyering last month, and recently meeting with the Conservative Women's Association in Yorkshire, the county of her husband's constituency, Richmond.