Why is the company linked to Johnson Chancellor’s wife Rishi Sunak, who is responsible for all government financial activities, still operating in Russia?
The UK has been extremely tough on any form of compromise with Russia. Putin’s country should be excluded from the SWIFT circuit, the interbank messaging network that is the backbone of international finance, to ban the Russian national airline Aeroflot from landing in Great Britain. As well as the public mockery of Western companies that still operate in Moscow and the ban on the export of high technology and tools for the extractive industry. Those who make different choices or even just express different ideas or strategies are easily accused of connivance with the enemyor, because the maximum economic and social damage must be inflicted on Russia.
But in these hours we get to know, after 68 days of war, that the wife of Rishi Sunak, British Chancellor of the Exchequer, third oldest state office in British history and cabinet minister with responsibility for all financial matters in the government of Boris Johnson, would have a £ 400 million stake in a company that still operates in Russia.
The British Labor Party has publicly asked Rishi Sunak, Chancellor of Boris Johnson, a former consultant to Goldman Sachs, a man of Indian origin but repeatedly vying to succeed Johnson, when he was caught in lunch during the lockdowns, to explain if the company in which the wife has shares continues to operate in Russia. Rhetorical question: According to the British parliament and the British national press, the Indian IT giant Infosys is still operating in Moscow.
Infosys is an Indian IT giant, still operating in Moscow despite announcing last month that it would close its offices in the capital. In August 2009, Rishi Sunak married Akshata Murthy, daughter of Narayana Murthy, an Indian billionaire and one of the founders of Infosys but who left the company in 2014 with no further involvement. Sunak was formerly director of the investment firm Catamaran Ventures, owned by his father-in-law.
Labor exponent Tulip Siddiq, secretary of the economy (post of the shadow government set up by the opposition, as in the British tradition) wrote to the Chancellor asking for an explanation.
Siddiq: “We cannot have a situation where a UK Chancellor and his family retain economic interests in Putin’s regime.”
And again: “The Labor party agrees that British and other multinational companies should not operate in Russia” … “the situation with Infosys is all the more urgent because your family members keep a stake in the company. This means that they could profit from companies operating under Putin’s terrible regime ”.
Siddiq thus invited Chancellor Sunak to confirm whether he had tried to clarify when Infosys would withdraw from Moscow and if any of his family members were benefiting from the company’s presence.
Ms. Murty would have a 0.93% stake in the global giant Infosys, which means she could earn from the profits made in Russia.
A spokesperson for Ms. Murty said the issues raised should “be addressed to Infosys, Ms Murty is one of many minority shareholders and has no involvement in the company’s operational decisions.”
But the case has caused a stir in the UK because one cannot impose such demanding behavior on othershow to demobilize one’s company from a territory, or even just ask for it so peremptorily, and then not behave accordingly or act in order not to be compromised by the choices and timing of others.
The story adds up to the statement made some time ago by Ms Murty, an Indian citizen, who announced that she would pay taxes on all her worldwide income in the United Kingdom. after it was revealed that she was not domiciled in the UK for tax purposes.
The disclosure was perceived as damaging Sunak’s hopes of succeeding Boris Johnsonas leader of the British Conservatives.
The giant Infosys has instead continued to say it wants to move from Russia, although more than two months later it has not yet happened: “During the quarterly results, Infosys announced its decision to move services from Russia to its global delivery centers. Although the company has no active relationship with local Russian companies, we have a small team of less than 100 employees in Russia serving some of our global customers. We are currently working closely with those customers who have been impacted to enable a smooth transition. “