The wife of British Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak is treated as non-domiciled for UK tax purposes, but pays taxes in Britain on all her UK income, her spokeswoman said on Wednesday.
Akshata Murthy is the daughter of Narayana Murthy, the billionaire cofounder of information technology services company Infosys, and she owns about 0.93 percent of the company.
The tax status means she would not pay taxes in Britain on dividends from the Indian business.
Photo: Reuters
The news, which yesterday featured prominently in British newspapers, came as the government is putting up taxes for millions of people.
British lawmaker and Shadow Economic Secretary to the Treasury Tulip Siddiq said that Sunak should say whether he had benefited from his wife’s tax status.
Akshata Murthy’s spokeswoman said that as a citizen of India, Akshata Murthy was treated under British law as non-domiciled for UK tax purposes because India does not allow its citizens to hold the citizenship of another country simultaneously.
Sunak, who became chancellor of the Exchequer in February 2020 just as the country entered the COVID-19 pandemic, is facing some of the toughest economic conditions in decades, with inflation soaring and living standards set to drop to levels last seen in the 1950s.
To help fund the rebuilding of the country’s national health service and its public finances, he has increased the tax take to the highest level since the 1940s.
“Akshata Murthy is a citizen of India, the country of her birth and parent’s home,” the spokeswoman said in a statement. “India does not allow its citizens to hold the citizenship of another country simultaneously.”
“She has always and will continue to pay UK taxes on all her UK income,” she added.
A person familiar with the situation said Sunak had declared his wife’s status to the government when he became a minister and the UK Treasury was also informed.
The person who asked not to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter added that Akshata Murthy pays foreign taxes on her foreign income.
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
Two Belgian teenagers on Tuesday were charged with wildlife piracy after they were found with thousands of ants packed in test tubes in what Kenyan authorities said was part of a trend in trafficking smaller and lesser-known species. Lornoy David and Seppe Lodewijckx, two 19-year-olds who were arrested on April 5 with 5,000 ants at a guest house, appeared distraught during their appearance before a magistrate in Nairobi and were comforted in the courtroom by relatives. They told the magistrate that they were collecting the ants for fun and did not know that it was illegal. In a separate criminal case, Kenyan Dennis
APPORTIONING BLAME: The US president said that there were ‘millions of people dead because of three people’ — Vladimir Putin, Joe Biden and Volodymyr Zelenskiy US President Donald Trump on Monday resumed his attempts to blame Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for Russia’s invasion, falsely accusing him of responsibility for “millions” of deaths. Trump — who had a blazing public row in the Oval Office with Zelenskiy six weeks ago — said the Ukranian shared the blame with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ordered the February 2022 invasion, and then-US president Joe Biden. Trump told reporters that there were “millions of people dead because of three people.” “Let’s say Putin No. 1, but let’s say Biden, who had no idea what the hell he was doing, No. 2, and
DEMONSTRATIONS: A protester said although she would normally sit back and wait for the next election, she cannot do it this time, adding that ‘we’ve lost too much already’ Thousands of protesters rallied on Saturday in New York, Washington and other cities across the US for a second major round of demonstrations against US President Donald Trump and his hard-line policies. In New York, people gathered outside the city’s main library carrying signs targeting the US president with slogans such as: “No Kings in America” and “Resist Tyranny.” Many took aim at Trump’s deportations of undocumented migrants, chanting: “No ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement], no fear, immigrants are welcome here.” In Washington, protesters voiced concern that Trump was threatening long-respected constitutional norms, including the right to due process. The
RSS