Team Blitz India
NEW DELHI: Days before Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is expected to travel to New Delhi to participate in the G20 Summit, news reports in the United Kingdom have raised issues over a ‘conflict of interest’.
The Guardian group of newspapers reported on August 26 that some members of British Parliament have called for Sunak to be more “transparent” about his wife, Akshata Murthy’s financial holdings.
This has once again raised the issue of her shareholding in Infosys, worth an estimated GBP 500 million pounds.The Bengalurubased international IT services and consultancy giant Infosys was cofounded by Akshata’s father NR Narayana Murthy with others in 1981.
The Guardian reportclaimed how “The position of the PM’s wife as a shareholder in a company that could benefit from an agreement is a major headache for No 10”.The same day, the group’s other publication, The Observer, came out with a report titled ‘Rishi Sunak faces fresh conflict of interest row over India trade talks’.
Speaking to the Observer, Alan Manning, a professor of economics at London School of Economics, who chaired the migration advisory committee to theGovernment from 2016 to 2020 said, “As the prime minister’s family may have a direct financial interest in any deal on immigration, he should recuse himself from this part of the negotiations to avoid any perception of conflict of interest”.
