Narayana Murthy told me I could have more impact on the world through politics than business: Rishi Sunak

LONDON: UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak says it was his father-in-law, Narayana Murthy, who encouraged him to make a career in UK politics and aim for the top job of PM as he told him he could have a greater impact on the world through politics rather than business.
Narayana Murthy is the billionaire founder of Infosys who has now devoted his life to philanthropy. Sunak worked for Goldman Sachs, gained an MBA from Stanford and then worked for a hedge fund before becoming an MP. Many wonder why he left such a well-paid career to enter the sparring world of politics.
“When it came to doing these jobs – it was actually my father-in-law,” Sunak told people attending a private hustings at the UK home of former partner in Blackstone Franks Subhash Thakrar in August, during his first leadership contest.
“I was always struck that a man who was so successful and created one of the world’s most successful companies, that employs hundreds of thousands of people, that literally has changed how an entire country is perceived, always felt that you could have more impact through politics rather than through business. Because I thought maybe actually you can do this through business and philanthropy and you could have an impact the way he and my mother-in-law have had,” Sunak said.
“But he was the one who said, ‘No, if you want to have an impact on the greater scale, the way to do it is through politics’, and he was always right behind me, encouraging me, and that is why I am here today,” Sunak added.
At the same hustings he spoke about his vision for the UK. “If you want to drive growth, you have to have to have an economy where innovation is at the heart of everything you do. That means we need to have companies creating new things, a government investing in R&D and we need to have a visa regime that attracts the best and brightest … and a culture where people are trying to do things differently. I know how to build that economy,” Sunak said.
He added the closest thing politicians have to a silver bullet that can solve most of the problems is education. “I want to make sure we have an education system that is the envy of the world. If we can make sure our schools are performing at the highest level, that we are using technology differently in our schools and make sure our curriculum reflects modern needs, if we can make sure our apprenticeships are turbo-charged, and if and we stop thinking about education as something that has to finish at 18 or 21 but as something pervasive through your life, then that is how we can really provide opportunity in the 21st century,” he said.