Celebrating Britain’s
101
Asians 2022
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GG2 Leadership and
Diversity Awards
Celebrating Britain’s
101
Asians 2022
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Editor-in-chief
Ramniklal Solanki CBE
1931-2020
Managing Editor
Kalpesh R Solanki
Executive Editor
Shailesh R Solanki
Digital Manager
Aditya Solanki
EDITORIAL
Contributors
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Barnie Choudhury
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Sarwar Alam
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Contents
22
Industry
Advocate
10
Heir
Apparent
44
Haute
Couture
42
Breaking
Boundaries
29
Banking
Guru
100
Prodigal
Daughter 62
Consumer
King
16
Migration
Matters
Power List GG2
2022 | GG2 Power List
Visit our website
www.royalnavy.mod.uk/careers
@royalnavy
“THE ONLY THING
THAT’S UNIFORM
ABOUT THE ROYAL
NAVY, IS THE
UNIFORM”
“We were born in
Middlesbrough, but
Made in the Royal Navy”
WELCOME to this the 11th GG2
Power List.
We publish this list in perhaps
the darkest of times on our conti-
nent since the Second World
War. The war in Ukraine is a sad
reminder that national and eth-
nic conflict remain a dark stain
on humanity and that we must
continue to work for under-
standing, acceptance and cour-
age in dispelling distrust and fear
as any sort of guide for human
behaviour.
That said, this publication
comes out on UN International
Women’s Day (March 8) and it is
great to celebrate the rise
of women in all walks
of life in Britain. You
will find a fair few
in this list.
The struggle
for equality con-
tinues and we
must elevate those
who break barriers
and create pathways
for others to follow.
In many ways what strikes us
is how many women of colour
have made such successful ca-
reers in politics.
We have a female home secre-
tary in Priti Patel and a female
attorney general in Suella
Braverman. Whatever their
politics, you still have to admire
the way they have come through
the system and made it in a very
male orientated and tough
environment.
There are lessons for business
surely. The appointment of Lee-
na Nair as CEO of Chanel is a
tremendous advance but at the
same time it shows how far we
have fallen as a society. We must
encourage and enable women to
achieve their full potential.
In similar ways, the diversity
cause has to be furthered – and it
was always our intention – and
remains so - to draw attention to
high-fliers and path breakers
with the GG2 Power List.
Our father, Ramniklal Solanki,
(inset) founded the company and
his example has always guided
and inspired us. He was awarded
a CBE in for his services to the
community and publishing. We
remain extremely proud of his
achievements. It is the first time
we are meeting again since his
sad passing in March 2020.
He was always a
community champion
and set up his first
publication, Garavi
Gujarat with our
mother, Parvatiben
and the two worked
tirelessly to give us
the foundation that
has enabled us to be
where we are today.
Identifying the 101 most influ-
ential Asians in this brilliant
country of ours is no easy task –
we try to look everywhere for
shining stars and those who have
achieved – and along with our
GG2 Leadership and Diversity
Awards, they represent a unique
and very special snapshot of a
community that continues to ex-
cel and prosper. We should all
take pride in these 101 individu-
als and their achievements.
Just as our dear father did wh-
en he first landed on these shores
with not much else...Enjoy!
Kalpesh R Solanki
and Shailesh R Solanki
Our panel of experts
The GG2 Power List was extensively researched and
compiled by a team of journalists, with the final
rankings adjudicated by an experienced panel...
A special snapshot
of Asian community
KALPESH R SOLANKI is group managing
editor of the Asian Media Group (AMG). He
graduated with a law degree (LLB Hons)
from Queen Mary College, London, and qual
ified as a barrister from the Inner Temple.
Kalpesh is responsible for the strategy and
growth of AMG operations over three coun
tries – America, Britain and India. He sits on
the board of the charity Pratham UK.
SHAILESH R SOLANKI is AMG’s executive
editor. He has 30 years experience in journal
ism, overseeing titles, including Eastern Eye,
Garavi Gujarat, Asian Trader, Pharmacy Bu
siness, Asian Hospitality and the Asian Rich
List. He has a keen interest in diversity and is
vice chair of the thinktank British Future, an
advisor to the Rare Dementia Support chari
ty and on the board of Pratham UK.
AMIT ROY is one of the most experienced
journalists to have covered the Asian
community. He is the editoratlarge at
Eastern Eye and has also worked as a
foreign correspondent for The Daily
Telegraph, The Daily Mail, The Sunday
Times and The Sunday Telegraph. Amit
has covered wars all over the world and has
written economic reports on India.
RITHIKA SIDDHARTHA edits GG2 and
Eastern Eye, the consumer titles published
by AMG. She began her journalism career in
India, working at The Asian Age newspaper
in Bangalore and New Delhi, before moving
to London. She secured exclusive inter
views with prime ministers David Cameron
and Theresa May ahead of the 2015 and
2017 general elections, respectively.
BARNIE CHOUDHURY is an awardwin
ning journalist who worked for the BBC
for 24 years. He is currently a communica
tions’ consultant and editoratlarge for
Eastern Eye. Barnie worked for the current
Commonwealth secretarygeneral as her
director of media and PR, and he was part
of the senior leadership team in several in
stitutions. He is a professor of professional
practice at the University of Buckingham.
SARWAR ALAM is AMG’s digital editor.
Under his leadership, Eastern Eye has
grown its online reach with the use of
newsletters and videos. He project managed
both editions of the Asian Rich List 2021 as
well as this issue of the GG2 Power List. He
began his career on ITV and has done
stints at Eurosport and ESPN, where he
covered major sporting events.
Power List GG2
2022 | GG2 Power List
by AMIT ROY
AMID speculation that the chancellor Rishi Su-
nak may become Britain’s first prime minister
of Asian origin, even Boris Johnson’s critics will
give him his due. Whatever his other faults, he
has headed the most diverse government in
British history.
While Sunak (1) heads the 2022 GG2 Power
List of the 101 most influential Asians in the
UK, he is followed by the health secretary Sajid
Javid (2) and the home secretary Priti Patel (3).
The author and former Tory party chairman,
Lord Ashcroft, was quick to bring out the first
biography of the chancellor, Going for Broke:
The Rise of Rishi Sunak.
Ashcroft has piranha teeth. Let’s say he has
been kinder to Sunak than he has been to the
prime minister’s spouse in First Lady: Intrigue
at the Court of Carrie and Boris Johnson.
It is worth remembering Sunak, who was
born on 12 May 1980, and won William Hague’s
seat, Richmond in North Yorkshire, in 2015, has
been an MP for barely seven years.
Ashcroft maintains Sunak’s ethnicity is no
longer an important factor: “Having spent
years doing political research, as well as being
involved in politics more generally, I honestly
don’t think those things matter to the vast ma-
jority of voters. People like Rishi because they
think he’s doing a good job.
“At the beginning hardly anyone outside
Westminster and Yorkshire had heard of Ri-
shi Sunak – then all of a sud-
den he was one of the most
powerful and influential fig-
ures in a government facing a
national crisis. I thought peo-
ple would be interested to
know more about him and
how he achieved such a me-
teoric rise.”
Ashcroft pointed out: “He’s only just 41 and
is clearly going to be a key player on the politi-
cal scene for some time to come. Depending
how things go, there may well be scope for a
second instalment of my book.”
Others who have Johnson to thank for their
chauffeur-driven ministerial limousines in-
clude Alok Sharma (14), who sits in cabinet
with the climate change brief, having been
COP26 president in 2021; the attorney general
Suella Braverman (16); foreign office minister
Lord Tariq Ahmad (21); and Ranil Jayawardene
(38), minister for international trade.
From Labour ranks, the Power List includes
the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan (4), though
no one thinks of him any more as the son of a
Pakistani bus driver, an advantage in life he
shares with the health secretary (David Camer-
on called them “the new Etonians”). Anas Sar-
war (94) could not be left out – after all, he is
leader of the Scottish Labour party.
The year 2022 marks the 50th anniversary of
the arrival of some 30,000 Ugandan Asian refu-
gees in Britain. They have certainly helped to
transform the economic landscape. This was a
country where shops shut at 5.30pm and any-
one who had the courage to go in, say, at
5.25pm to get a bottle of milk was likely to get
an unfriendly look from a grumpy shopkeeper.
Although the Ugandan Asians were British
passport holders, they still had to fight to get in.
They certainly did not receive the warm wel-
come that has been extended to those fleeing
Afghanistan and now Ukraine in a much less
racist Britain.
Today, it is generally recognised that Asians
are pretty good at doing business. Compared
with America, though, it has not been easy for
Asians to break through the glass ceiling in cor-
porate Britain but as this year’s Power List
demonstrates, the winds of change are blowing
through the boardrooms.
The highest new entry this year at 9 is C S
Venkatakrishnan, who has taken over as CEO
of the Barclays Group, one of the biggest banks
in the world. Also, at Barclays, Ashok Vaswani
(30) has become chief digital officer.
It is worth recalling when the Ugandan
Asians arrived penniless in 1972, the banks
were loath to give them loans.
It took a few years to build up a relationship
of mutual trust.
At Reckitt Benckiser, the multinational con-
sumer goods company, Laxman Narasimhan
(41) has replaced another Asian, Rakesh Ka-
poor, as CEO.
Adar Poonawalla, CEO of the Serum Institute
of India, the world’s biggest vaccine manufac-
turer, is a new entrant at 15. Though his UK
subsidiary, Serum Life Sciences, he has al-
ready committed himself to
investing £240m in the UK.
He has given £50m to Oxford
University and put in £50m in
Oxford Biomedica, which will
create “120 new, highly
skilled jobs”.
Incidentally, Poonawalla
happens to be a Parsi belonging to the Zoroas-
trian faith – just like Lord Karan Bilimoria (6),
who has certainly made a difference as presi-
dent of the Confederation of British Industry.
He has managed to push the cause of ethnic
diversity in British boardrooms, especially the
FTSE100 and FTSE250 companies, as well at
senior executive level. Before Bilimoria’s arriv-
al, the focus was almost exclusively on gender
diversity. Maybe had the president of the CBI
not been an Asian, the priorities would have
remained unchanged. With his ability to argue
his case eloquently, logically and politely, Bili-
moria will probably go down as a very success-
ful CBI president. He apparently worked close-
ly with Sunak when the chancellor was intro-
ducing furlough and other schemes to help or-
dinary working people through the pandemic.
In the world of science, academia and medi-
cine, Asians have made their mark.
For example, the attempt to devise personal-
ised treatment for cancer by Prof Sir Shankar
Balasubramanian (22), the Herchel Smith Pro-
fessor of Medicinal Chemistry at the Yusuf
Hamied department of chemistry at Cambridge
University, will benefit all of mankind. Inciden-
tally, his department is named after Yusuf
Hamied (66), head of the pharma giant, Cipla,
who also figures on the Power List.
Among scientists whose advice was much
sought by the media during the pandemic is
Sunetra Gupta (74), infectious disease
epidemiologist and a professor of theoretical
epidemiology at the Department of Zoology at
Oxford University.
Among the scientists behind the develop-
ment of the Oxford-AstraZaneca vaccine has
been Maheshi Ramasamy (48), a principal
investigator in the group who led on adult clin-
ical trials.
From all the top economists in Britain and
indeed around the world, the treasury picked
Sir Partha Dasgupta, the Frank Ramsey Profes-
sor Emeritus of Economics at Cambridge Uni-
versity, to deliver his landmark report, “The
Economics of Biodiversity”, on the existential
Love in the time of pandemic
Those who helped country tide over the crisis represented the best of UK
GG2 Power List
GG2 Power List | 2022
All of a sudden
he (Sunak) was a
powerful figure
Prince Charles with Rishi and
Akshata Sunak; (below) Duchess of
Cornwall, Prince of Wales, Natasha
Poonawalla and Adar Poonawalla
© Tristan Fewings/Getty Images
“Making quality healthcare an affordable and
accessible reality throughout the world”
The GG2 Leadership
& Diversity Awards
2022
Proud Sponsors of:
Celebrating the Outstanding
Achievements in Science
www.morningsidepharm.com
threat facing humanity from climate change.
The arts have long been considered the ex-
clusive preserve of white people, as have the
media, especially Fleet Street and the world of
national newspapers, where popular percep-
tions are shaped and prejudices confirmed.
Thus, Krishnendu Majumdar’s arrival as the
first non-white chairman of Bafta has been like
a breath of fresh air. He has initiated changes
both in front and behind the camera.
The Power List is being released on March 8,
2022 – international women’s day. A third of
the Power List is made up of women. For exam-
ple, Leena Nair (18) is the CEO of the French
luxury brand, Chanel.
Chila Burman (81) and Rana Begum (87) are
big name artists. Captain Preet Chandi (17) of
the British Army – better known as “Polar
Preet” – is proving to be a remarkable role
model after trekking 700 miles solo to the south
Pole. And the comedienne Sindhu Vee (71), a
familiar figure on television, has explained why
her surname – Venkatanarayanan – is not al-
ways easy to give out over the telephone when
making credit card purchases. Enabling Asians
to laugh at themselves is a cathartic exercise.
A common question to us is, “How do you
compile your Power List?”, followed by, “How
do you rank people?”
Most years we begin with several hundred
names and then whittle them down to a final
Power List of 101. Our selection panel has had
more meetings than I can remember as it be-
came progressively harder to remove people
from the shortlist.
Most years we try and offer a snapshot of
what Asian movers and shakers have been up
to in the previous 12 months. We also endeav-
our to give the list a fresh look with a 25-30 per
cent change from one year to the next.
But Covid put paid to the normal way in
which the Power List is compiled.
We would soon discover the pandemic was
taking a heavy toll among British Asians. It was
not known immediately that living in multi-
generational households or having underlying
conditions, such as diabetes or heart disease,
made Asians more vulnerable to Covid-19.
Lack of proper Personal Protection Equipment
(PPE) put frontline NHS staff, especially Asian
doctors and nurses, at even greater risk.
In the early days of the pandemic, there was
tragedy after tragedy. Dr Abdul Mabud Chowd-
hury, a Bangladeshi-origin consultant urologist
at Homerton University Hospital, east London,
died, aged 53, on April 8, 2020.
It emerged he had written to “Dear and Re-
spectable Prime Minister Boris Johnson”
pleading for better PPE: “Please ensure urgent-
ly Personal Protective Equipment for each and
every NHS health worker in the UK. Remember
we may be doctor/nurse/HCA/allied health
workers who are in direct contact with patients
but we are also human beings.”
Dr Manjeet Singh Riyat, an emergency care
consultant at the Royal Derby Hospital, died,
aged 52, on 20 April 2020. His colleagues said
that “Manjeet was considered the father of the
current emergency department in Derby.”
There were many other losses. On 12 May,
2020, Dr Poornima Nair, a GP at the Station
View medical centre in Bishop Auckland,
County Durham, became the first female doc-
tor to die from Covid-19.
Her son, Varun Nair Balupuri, 28, a data sci-
entist, said: “My mother was kind, caring and
loving to her family, friends and patients, as ev-
idenced by the hundreds of tributes and me-
morials to her. In her 56 years of life, she ac-
complished more than most can even imagine
while always having time and love for those
around her. Her passion for
life and the integrity in which
she faced challenges will
serve as an inspiration to me
and many others.”
That old saying – “Cometh
the hour, cometh the man” –
has certainly been true in the
case of Dr Chaand Nagpaul
(5), who has been chairman of the British Med-
ical Association, during this critical phase.
He is the first non-white BMA chairman in
the history of the organisation, which was set
up in 1832.
He told the BMJ which kept a roll call of doc-
tors lost during the pandemic: “The vast major-
ity who have sadly died are from a BAME back-
ground, with many coming from overseas to
contribute their valuable skills and expertise to
the NHS to save the lives of others, only to trag-
ically lose their own.”
When GG2 interviewed Nagpaul for the
Power List, he revealed he very nearly did not
make it as a GP. Despite qualifying with a bril-
liant academic record from the elite St Bar-
tholomew’s Hospital Medical College,
he received “nine rejections in a
row” when he applied for a place
on the GP training scheme.
Someone explained the
sticking point to him: “It’s
your name.”
Nagpaul hadn’t en-
countered such racism
before: “It didn’t strike me that my name would
be a barrier.”
He pressed the government to procure safer
and adequate PPE for doctors. He also sought a
level playing field for Asian and black doctors
by starting to tackle the racism in the NHS laid
bare by the pandemic.
“Sadly, in the NHS, there is plenty of evi-
dence that the experience of BAME doctors is
not equal,” said Nagpaul, who persuaded the
government to introduce more “culturally sen-
sitive” Covid messaging.
The pandemic has thrown up new figures,
such as Dr Nikita Kanani (23), medical director
of NHS England, who has sometimes been by
the prime minister’s side during his live brief-
ings from Downing Street.
The Britain of 2022 may not be recognised
by those who came to these shores more than
50 years ago from India, Paki-
stan and East Africa. The days
of “No dogs or coloureds” in
rented accommodation have
long since gone. The changes
in British society plus the bat-
tles fought by black people
from the Caribbean and from
Africa on behalf of the ethnic
minorities have ushered in radical changes. To
the credit of the indigenous British folk, it also
has to be recognised that the seeds of Asian
success have been planted in fertile soil.
That said, many racist attitudes remain en-
trenched, often at the higher levels of society.
There is, for example, a refusal to recognise
that the British Empire was not always a force
for good, as argued in Sathnam Sanghera’s (64)
Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped
Modern Britain.
Many on the Power List have risen despite
the obstacles they have encountered. As East-
ern Eye reports have revealed, there clearly is
an entrenched problem in the legal world,
where senior white judges find it all too easy to
bully junior Asian colleagues, especially if
they are women. We also saw how See-
ma Misra and other subpostmasters
and subposmistresses, many of
them Asian, were wrongly accused
of theft by the Post Office and
even sent to prison by a vengeful
white coterie consisting of the
CEO Paula Vennells and her sen-
ior executives.
However, Asians who ran cor-
nershops and convenience
stores – rightly deemed an “es-
sential service” – did a heroic job
during the long, dark months of
lockdown. The way that the
Asian community came to-
gether to see the coun-
try through the pan-
demic represent-
ed the best of
Britain.
GG2 Power List
GG2 Power List | 2022
Her passion for
life and integrity
will inspire many
Dr Chaand Nagpaul with wife;
(right, from left) Shlokarth
Balupuri, Dr Poornima Nair,
and Varun Nair Balupuri
Harpreet
Chandi; (inset
right) Rana
Begum
© Royal Academy
CONGRATULATIONS
to all the nominees
Proud to support the
GG2 Leadership Awards 2018
GG2 Leadership Awards 2019
Proud to support the
Proud to support the
GG2 Leadership &
Diversity Awards 2022
Rishi Sunak
Politics
FOR those watching closely, the two most
powerful politicians in the United Kingdom,
who live next door to one another, may soon
have to have a reckoning.
The big political question this year is: did Ri-
shi betray Boris, or did he say what was on eve-
ryone’s mind, but they were too scared to put
their head above the parapet?
For the past few months, the Conservative
party has been in free-fall since the revelations
that the prime minister was involved in a series
of potential breaches of lockdown rules. So
much so, the Metropolitan Police are investi-
gating a sitting prime minister, and it could
cost Johnson his premiership if he is found to
have misled parliament.
Not only that, the prime minister also tried
to divert attention by making a fake slur against
the Labour leader, for which he will not apolo-
gise. In the middle of this series of unfortunate
political errors, his neighbour at Number 11
was asked whether the prime minister should
apologise and withdraw his allegation that Keir
Starmer was responsible for not prosecuting
the serial sex offender, Jimmy Savile. “Dishy”
Rishi, as he is known responded, “Being hon-
est, I wouldn’t have said it and I’m glad the PM
clarified what he meant.”
It has divided the party, and the man who is
so careful, may have made an error of judge-
ment, no matter how true his answer.
Valentine’s Day will forever have an added
piquancy for the current occupant of Number
11 Downing Street. It was the day when his
very good friend, and then boss, Sajid Javid, re-
signed after the prime minister ordered him to
fire his aides. Johnson immediately promoted
Sunak from Treasury chief secretary to chan-
cellor. The MP for Richmond in north Yorkshire
had just four weeks to deliver his first budget,
something his predecessor never got to do. Not
only that, Sunak had to do so in the middle of a
global pandemic, and he won huge plaudits on
his side of the aisle, business and the NHS.
“The biggest rabbit he pulled out of the hat,
which was the furlough scheme, is undoubted-
ly one of the things I would say has been pivot-
al in retaining some economic stability and
personal security for a lot of people in the
country,” says one Westminster insider, who
did not wish to be named.
“To do that as a relatively new chancellor – at
that point he wasn’t even 40 years old – it was a
huge responsibility on relatively young, let’s be
clear, pretty inexperienced, shoulders.”
Sunak cuts a dashing figure; some have desc r-
i b ed him as the Conservative equivalent of Lab o-
ur’s Tony Blair when he took over his party in
1994. Indeed, the Daily Mail, the bastion of wh i-
te, middle England, heralded him “PM in waiti-
ng”. Speak to many and, at this moment, the mo-
st used word to describe Sunak is “impressive”.
Sunak has achieved more in his 40 years
than many of us will in a lifetime. Head boy at
the independent boarding school, Winchester
Prime minister in waiting?
Chancellor Sunak is poised for the top job
COMMITTED:
Rishi Sunak
GG2 Power List
10
GG2 Power List | 2022