‘Don’t have working-class friends’: Rishi Sunak’s decades-old video goes viral on social media

An old video of Rishi Sunak, one of the top contenders for the post of British Prime Minister, is making rounds on social media.

The video where 21-year-old Rishi Sunak is saying he does not have working-class friends has created a stir amid the speculation of him being one of the frontrunners.

In the BBC documentary ‘Middle Classes- Their Rise & Sprawl’, Sunak said, “I have friends who are aristocrats, I have friends who are upper-class, I have friends who are, you know, working-class. Well, not working class”.

“I mix and match and then I go to see kids from an inner-city state school and tell them to apply to Oxford and talk to them about people like me. And then I shocked them at the end of chatting with them for half an hour and tell them I was at Winchester and one of my best friends is from Eton or whatever. And then they’re like: ‘Oh OK’,” Rishi Sunak said in the documentary.

In the documentary, Rishi Sunak talked about studying at Winchester College and then at Oxford. He said that he was very lucky to have an education in these places as it “put me as an elite in society”. He added that he considers himself a professional middle class, and does not think being Asian is a defining feature.

42-year-old Rishi Sunak dropped his campaign for election as Britain’s next prime minister and the leader of the Tories soon after PM Boris Johnson announced to step down from the post.

He launched his campaign with the hashtag ‘Ready for Rishi'(#Ready4Rishi).

In his campaign, Sunak started with a story — the story of his grandmother who came to the UK with dreams and the country gave her wings, thus paving the way for his dreams to come true. He promised the same to others if they voted him to power.

“Someone has to grip this moment and make the right decisions. That’s why I am standing to be the next leader of the Conservative Party and your Prime Minister,” was his pitch in the campaign video.

Apart from Rishi Sunak, Iraqi-origin Nadhim Zahawi who is the present UK Chancellor, and Transport Secretary Grant Shapps also declared their candidacies on Saturday. Former health minister Sajid Javid, former foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt are also in the fray.