Infosys Murthy's son-in-law Sunak in Boris' cabinet

Newly appointed Prime Minister Boris Johnson named 39-year-old Conservative Party MP Rishi Sunak as his cabinet's Chief Secretary to the Treasury on Thursday.

A Stanford MBA graduate and an Oxford graduate, the investment expert takes charge of one of the most important jobs in the UK Treasury and will be serving under the new Chancellor, Sajid Javid.

Sunak, married to Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy’s daughter Akshata, is a prominent Indian-origin pro-Brexit campaigner and will be replacing Liz Truss as the Chief Secretary to the Treasury.

The UK-born son of a pharmacist mother and a National Health Service (NHS) general practitioner father, he co-founded a GBP 1-billion global investment firm and specialised in investing in small British businesses before his entry to the British Parliament in the 2015 general election.

Since his re-election in the 2017 snap election called by Theresa May, Sunak has long been considered a rising star as he took over junior ministerial roles and was widely tipped for a promotion in the Johnson Cabinet.

“From working in my mum's tiny chemist shop to my experience building large businesses, I have seen how we should support free enterprise and innovation to ensure Britain has a stronger future,” Sunak had said during the Brexit referendum.

He strongly believes that small businesses in the UK would flourish as a result of Brexit as the “vast majority of British businesses (94 per cent) don’t have anything to do with the EU; but they are still subject to all EU law”.

On the way to attending his first Cabinet meeting at 10 Downing Street on Thursday morning, Sunak declared the new UK government was “toughening up”.

With inputs from PTI