Fortnightly notes from London: A British ‘Desi’ in the race to be Theresa May’s successor ? 

Rishi who?

Mention his name to anyone outside the Westminster bubble and you're likely to get a blank stare: “Sorry, mate, dunno what you're talking about.” But, apparently, bookmakers are familiar with his name. And for a good reason. Rishi Sunak, better known in India as the tech industrialist NR Narayana Murthy's son-in-law, is being touted as a potential British Tory party leader to replace the lame-duck prime minister Theresa May .

Bets are being laid on his chances and though currently he’s not exactly on the top of the heap, the odds are that if the party decides to skip a generation and pick a young leader he could leap into the front of the queue. The party has done this before; that’s how David Cameron got to be elected.

Born and brought up in Britain, 37-year-old Oxford educated businessman-turned-politician is married to Murthy's daughter Akshata. He made his parliamentary debut in 2015 when he was parachuted into the safest Tory seat in the country-- Richmond in rural Yorkshire—as part of Cameron's drive to induct more ethnic minority faces. Some 90 applicants were brushed aside to fast-track his candidature.

But, poor Cameron. When the chips were down for him over the EU referendum, Sunak dumped him to join the Brexit bandwagon nailing his colours to the party's anti-EU, anti-immigration right-wing. In the leadership campaign to replace Cameron after the referendum defeat, he threw his weight behind Michael Gove, the party’s biggest hawk on Brexit and immigration. Gove, of course, didn’t make it, wrecking Sunak’s hope of a seat around the cabinet table.

With another leadership race imminent, however, the future beckons again, especially after his impressive performance in the 2017 election when even as many stalwarts fell by the wayside, he not only retained his seat but increased his victory margin. Urbane, articulate and media-savvy, he has carefully cultivated his image as a champion of populist causes. Another Indian-origin contender is Priti Patel, secretary of state for international development, and like Sunak a Brexiteer and a xenophobe.

What's it about British Indians and right- winger-y?

The privacy myth

I hate to spoil a good party but am slightly bewildered by all this confetti-flinging and high-fives over the Supreme Court’s privacy judgement. Yes, Modi's Big Brother regime has got a bit of an egg on its face; and of course privacy matters. But whose privacy? What does privacy really mean in a country where millions of people are forced to live in the open—sleep in the open, cook in the open, eat in the open, defecate in the open, wash in the open, and deliver babies in the open?

India has one of the largest populations of homeless people with some 400,000 children alone living on the streets. Tell them they've just won a huge victory against invasion of their privacy, and you might struggle to translate their reaction into printable language. It's sort of akin to Marie Antoinette telling the starving French masses to help themselves to cake if the bread has run out. It’s India's liberal elite imitating the western fixation with privacy even as they happily let their private lives hang out on social media for all the world to see.

Then, there's the small matter of relying on the government to protect privacy which, as the American poet John Perry Barlow said, is a little “like asking a peeping tom to install your window blinds”. Governments don't do privacy. Britain has some of the toughest privacy and data protection laws in Europe but that hasn't stopped successive governments from continuing to invade their citizens’ privacy on one pretext or the other.

Finally, in the age of technology when every time you sign up for anything you are parting with loads of personal data that then is used to track your lifestyle asking for privacy is disingenous. So, just relax. Que sera, sera.

Invisible ministers

British foreign secretary Boris Johnson and his Indian counterpart Sushma Swaraj couldn't be more different from each other in temperament and background. One is flamboyant and notoriously gaffe-prone, the other so restrained and old-fashioned as to be almost boring. But they have one thing in common: despite their high-profile positions both are marginalised figures in their governments—barely tolerated by their respective bosses, Theresa May and Narendra Modi. Kept away from big action, Johnson and Swaraj must be the world's most invisible foreign ministers.

Johnson has not been involved in any big policy, and under him, the Foreign Office has been reduced to being a glorified extension of Downing Street. And ditto Swaraj's supposed kingdom in South Block: it has been hijacked by Modi's almighty PMO and his national security adviser. She is just a figurehead shuffling papers and greeting foreign visitors with little involvement in major decisions.

And all because she once belonged to the “wrong” camp in the party. Hell, as his critics have discovered, hath no fury like Modi scorned.

Business as usual

For all the praise heaped on the SC verdict on triple talaq, the depressing reality is that it’s unlikely to change anything on the ground. The reason is simple: most of the triple talaq victims happen to come from uneducated, poor, and conservative backgrounds weighed down by family pressures--including their own parents--to keep quiet in the name of family “izzat” . And I don't see those pressures disappear overnight. Even prior to this ruling, it was open to them to seek judicial redress at least in relation to maintenance and custody of children. But how many did?

Muscle-flexing by the usual suspects has already begun. Groups like the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind (JUH) and All-India Muslim Personal Law Board have made clear that the verdict makes no difference and instant triple talaq still remains valid. “Even now, if a man administers instant talaq, it will come into effect as per Shariah for those who believe in it,” Jamiat’s General Secretary Maulana Mahmood Madani said.

Unfortunately, this regressive view is more widespread than is assumed. If a poll were to be conducted, I reckon, a majority of Muslim men are likely to vote against the verdict. So, let’s all take a deep breath. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose, as the French say.