For the first time in Rishi Sunak’s 20 months as Britain’s prime minister, the issue of his Indian heritage has appeared above the political parapet. A right-wing rival has alleged that Sunak doesn’t really understand the country he leads and so may not be a British patriot in full measure.
This is a grim time for Sunak. His campaign for the coming general election has been a shambles. He’s almost certain to lead the Conservative Party to a humiliating defeat when the country votes on July 4, 2o24. And a key rival – Nigel Farage, leader of the hard right, anti-immigration, Reform UK party – has now publicly asserted that one of Sunak’s biggest campaign mis-steps was because “he doesn’t understand our history and culture”.
Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty
Farage immediately insisted that his jibe was nothing to do about race but about other aspects of the Sunak’s background. The Reform UK leader accused Sunak of being “utterly disconnected by class, by privilege, from how the ordinary folk in the country feel”. But this poisoned comment seems to suggest that Sunak’s family story, as the son of immigrants (his parents were born in East Africa and have Punjabi heritage), somehow weakens his claim to lead the country where he was born.
Across the political spectrum, the Farage’s below-the-belt punch has been repudiated. A member of Sunak’s cabinet, Mel Stride, described his comment as “very uncomfortable”. Stride added: “I am very proud of the fact that we have a British Asian who is right at the top of our government”.
Shabana Mahmood, a senior figure in the opposition Labour Party – which has a commanding lead in the opinion polls – said the remark was “completely unacceptable” and came from a politician who has “a track record of seeking to divide communities”. She accused Farage of ‘dog whistle’ politics – a term used to describe a coded appeal to racism which is not overtly racist.
It’s unlikely that race will feature prominently in the remaining weeks of the election campaign, and surprising that it has flared up as an issue at all. There are still pockets of racism in British society but all the mainstream parties are committed to eradicating racial disadvantage. While the level of immigration is a big political issue, the discussion does not focus on the race of those seeking to enter Britain.
Nigel Farage. Photo: X/@Nigel_Farage
The really damning case against Sunak is that he has repeatedly demonstrated poor political judgement. Last week, leaders from across Europe and North America gathered on France’s Normandy coast to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day, the landing of British and allied troops in Nazi-occupied France, which turned the tide of the Second World War. That invasion force, back in June 1944, was the biggest amphibious wartime landing in history and is still seen in Britain as a moment of national pride and heroism.
The gathering in Normandy was probably the last to be attended by any significant number of D-Day veterans. Sunak was present for some of the reunions and ceremonies but headed home early, missing the international commemoration. So the group photograph of the French president, the German chancellor, and America’s Joe Biden doesn’t include Britain’s leader, because he had hurried back to resume his election campaign.
Sunak’s decision to retreat early from the D-Day events was seen as an affront to the military veterans, a disgrace to national sentiment as well as a political and diplomatic own goal. The prime minister has had the grace to concede that he made a mistake and to tweet an apology. But the damage was done. Farage – one of the most effective communicators in British politics – seized on the moment to question the prime minister’s patriotism. And across the political landscape, the question lingers: how could any leader be so politically ill-attuned, and badly advised, to pull out of a high-profile event that is central to Britain’s sense of itself?
The Conservatives’ already stuttering campaign was further damaged by Sunak’s ill-considered D-Day pull-out. Farage’s Reform UK party – which accuses Sunak’s government of being timid and ineffective, especially on immigration – believes it could wrest millions of votes from them and emerge as a powerful opposition to the expected Labour government.
Some senior Conservatives – including another of Indian heritage, Suella Braverman – are urging that Reform UK and the Conservatives join forces after the election. Braverman says it’s time to ‘unite the right’ and considers there’s ‘not much difference’ between Farage’s policies and those of her party.
However, there is one big difference. Farage is a loud-mouthed populist who is unscrupulous about how he appeals to voters’ fears and vulnerabilities; Sunak is instinctively a politician of integrity and decency. What does it say about British politics that Farage seems to be on the way up and Sunak on the way out?
Andrew Whitehead is a former BBC India correspondent.
London Calling: How does India look from afar? Looming world power or dysfunctional democracy? And what’s happening in Britain, and the West, that India needs to know about and perhaps learn from? This fortnightly column helps forge the connections so essential in our globalising world.
