Rishi Sunak addressed his reasons for accepting the position at 10 Downing Street amid a time of political unrest last year, during a televised interview with Piers Morgan to honour his 100th day in office as Britain’s first Prime Minister of Indian descent. In the interview, he called it his “dharma”.
What did Rishi Sunak say?
He was questioned in the interview about his choice to accept the difficult position in the midst of a crisis in the cost of living and about the 45-day tenure of his predecessor Liz Truss as prime minister. Rishi said, “For me it’s about duty. There’s a concept in Hinduism called dharma, which roughly translates into duty and that’s how I was raised. It was about doing the things that were expected of you and trying to do the right thing.”
The 42-year-old MP, who used the Bhagavad Gita as his pledge of loyalty when he was elected to the House of Commons, has regularly highlighted how his Hindu beliefs give him strength. He was born in the UK to Usha, a pharmacist, and Yashveer, an NHS doctor. He has mentioned going to the temple often with his family.
He continued further, by saying, “Even though it was going to be a nightmare job I felt that I could make a difference and was the best person to make a difference at that moment, especially given the challenges that people were facing, what they were seeing with their mortgages and that’s ultimately why I put myself forward to do it knowing that it would be difficult and challenging but ultimately doing what was my duty in that situation. I believe deeply in service and thought I could make a difference for the country.”
Rishi Sunak and his faith in Hinduism
In order to receive blessings on Janmashtami, he took a break from his leadership campaign the previous year to go to a Hare Krishna temple in London. He acknowledged being “fortunate” to have his wife Akshata, the daughter of Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy, as his partner and referred to her as his support system in a recent interview. He thanked her for supporting him in his work and told her about the beautiful proposal he had made to her on one knee.
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