dian prime minister happily received Sunak,
his wife, Akshata Murty, their daughters,
Krishna and Anoushka, and his mother-in-
law, Sudha Murty, which would suggest the
former prime minister will remain a figure
of consequence in Indo-British relations.
The judges decided to keep Sunak in the top
10 for this year but at number 5.
Although there is markedly less diversity
in the cabinet, there are Asians in Starmer’s
inner circle in 10, Downing Street. They do
not have a public profile in the conventional
sense but must have influence through
sheer proximity to the prime minister.
Nin Pandit wouldn’t pass the “Southall
test”, in that that the average Asian on the
street or a member of the public for that
matter probably would not have heard of
her. But she is a new entry, ranked fourth,
through virtue of being the principal private
secretary to the prime minister.
She was once described by Dominic
Cummings as one of “the brilliant women
around the table” who would have done the
job of prime minister “10 times better” than
Boris Johnson.
Pandit is a new entry as is Vidhya Alake-
son, who is deputy chief of staff at No 10.
She is ranked sixth. She was previously the
Labour party’s director of external affairs
and has apparently been close to Starmer
for the last three years.
In October when Starmer’s then chief of
staff, Sue Gray, resigned, she was replaced
by Morgan McSweeny, who had master-
minded Labour’s general election campaign.
Pandit was brought in to lend stability to
the government. Meanwhile, Alakeson and
Jill Cuthbertson were two new deputy
chiefs of staff. Incidentally,
Kunal Patel, the deputy prin-
cipal private secretary under
Pandit, is 51st.
There are other Asians in
key political roles. Ravinder
Athwal, ranked 24, who craft-
ed Labour’s general election
manifesto, is now a special adviser to the
prime minister. On the day of the manifesto
launch, it was Athwal – not Starmer or shad-
ow chancellor Rachel Reeves – who was
briefing journalists on the fine print.
Varun Chandra, a new entry at 41, is a
special adviser to the prime minister on
business and investment. At the Labour
conference last October, he told business
leaders behind closed doors that he would
try to be their interface with government.
John Lehal, a new entry at 54, is the La-
bour party’s chief operating officer.
There is only a sprinkling of Asian minis-
terial talent in the lower ranks of govern-
ment. This is represented by Seema Mal-
hotra (44), who is parliamentary under-sec-
retary for migration and citizenship at the
home office, and also for equalities in the
department of education; and Rushanara Ali
(a new entry at 81), parliamentary under-
secretary in the ministry of housing, com-
munities and local government.
Three first time MPs, all Labour, are new
entries on the Power List – Kanishka Naray-
an (91), member for the Vale of Glamorgan;
Dr Zubir Ahmed (94), member for Glasgow
south-west; and Jeevun Sandher (97), mem-
ber for Loughborough. They are being
marked out for future stardom.
In banking, finance and business general-
ly, Asians have got to the top. Banks which
were once reluctant to lend money to Ugan-
dan Asians when they first arrived in Britain
as refugees, now realise the UK is dependent
on Asian entrepreneurship.
C S Venkatakrishnan (8) is CEO of Barclays
plc, while Vim Maru, a new entry at 31,
heads Barclays Retail. Meanwhile, Pam Kaur,
a new entry at 47, is the group chief finan-
cial officer at HSBC.
Ashwin Prasad, a new entry at 52, is the
chief commercial officer at Tesco. Aki
Husain (79) is CEO of Hiscox, the specialist
insurance company.
The relationship between wealth and
power is not an obvious one. In fact, only a
handful of the people on GG2’s Rich List
make it on to the Power List. Wealth obvi-
ously buys influence. At its most basic, even
the busiest restaurant will generally make
room for a wealthy patron when other cus-
tomers may be denied a booking. But it’s
how the wealth is used that distinguishes
the rich from the powerful.
The Hindujas, who have dominated the
Rich List for well over a decade, are also on
the Power List but at number 14, one below
Samir Shah, the chairman of the BBC. The
Hindujas have invested
heavily in the healthcare sec-
tor because they say they are
motivated by the family mot-
to, “Work to give”.
Lakshmi Mittal and his
son, Aditya, executive chair-
man and CEO of ArcelorMit-
tal respectively, are second
on the Rich list and at 16 on the Power List.
It is worth mentioning the chancellor’s at-
tack on non-doms is stripping the UK of
some of its wealthiest and most influential
Asians. People are being lured away by the
low tax regime in Dubai.
Lord Jitesh Gadhia (ninth on the Power
List), a member of the Court of the Bank of
England, its governing body, said: “We now
have an exodus of people going to the Gulf.
There’s almost a critical mass. It’s like what
happened when East African Asians, very
enterprising people, arrived in the UK.
That’s effectively happening in plac-
es like the UAE. The government
has got be quite bold in not only
stopping the haemorrhaging
but also in re-attracting wealth
creators and entrepreneurs.”
It is also worth pointing out
that Dr Swati Dhingra, an ex-
ternal member of the Bank of
England’s Monetary Policy Com-
mittee – she is at number 20 – has
just had her three-year term ex-
tended by another three
years by the chancellor.
Dhingra’s influence lies in shaping the
Bank’s policy on interest rates.
In academia, Professor Joya Chatterji of
Cambridge University, is ranked at number
69. In December she won the Wolfson, the
“most prestigious history writing prize” in
the UK for book, Shadows at Noon: The
South Asian Twentieth Century. But there is
an even better reason for having her on the
Power List. She is passing on the flame – her
love of history – to her “beloved PhD stu-
dents” from all over the world.
The arts are pulling in young Asians even
though parents once insisted their children
enter “safe” professions such as medicine,
law or accountancy. The BBC have turned A
A Dhand’s novel, City of Sinners, into Virdee,
a six-part crime drama.
The comedian Romesh Ranganath (19) is
ubiquitous on TV. The actor Riz Ahmed (25)
has made a name both in both America and
in the UK. Meera Syal (34) starred in the
play, A Tupperware of Ashes, written by Tani-
ka Gupta (90), at the National Theatre where
Indhu Rubasingham will soon be in sole
charge as its artistic director. The artist Chila
Burman (67) lit up London’s West End as
well as the Imperial War Museum North in
Manchester with her neon installations. The
actress Ambika Mod (71) has starred in Netf-
lix dramas.
And one shouldn’t forget the singer Char-
lie XCX (7), whose mother, Shameera , was
born into a Muslim family of Gujarati de-
scent in Uganda.
In medicine, Dr Yusuf Hamied, the Lon-
don-based head of the Indian pharmacy gi-
ant Cipla, has given donations to many
charities but his dollar a day cocktail of
drugs saved the lives of 15 million AIDs pa-
tients in Africa.
Cardiologist Professor Jaspal Kooner
has set up a South Asia biobank of
100,000 people in the UK to solve
the mystery of why Asians are so vul-
nerable to heart attacks and diabe-
tes. He needs another £20m-£50m
to continue his work, which seems
cheap at the prices. “As far as our
research is concerned,” says Kooner,
“it’s centred around large questions
which affect the south Asian popula-
tion worldwide – that’s a quarter
of the world’s population.”
GG2 Power List
GG2 Power List | 2025
We now have an
exodus of people
going to the Gulf
GROWING PRESENCE: Keir
Starmer with Shabana Mahmood
and Lisa Nandy (below); Vidhya
Alakeson (bottom)
Prof Joya Chatterji after
receiving The Wolfson
History Prize 2024