'Stanford teaches you to think bigger': How Britain's new Prime Minister - and its first of color - was a Fulbright Scholar who credits the California business school with changing his life (but none of his professors remember him!)

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He is Britain's first non-white Prime Minister who's inheriting a country on its knees in the wake of disastrous economic policies by his predecessor.

But Rishi Sunak could be the right man for the job, having left Stanford University with an MBA from its world class business school.

The Conservative leader, who is set to take over from Liz Truss tomorrow morning, attended the exclusive California institution on a Fulbright scholarship in 2006.

He left the college with one of the most prestigious degrees in the world, as well as meeting his future wife - the billionaire heiress Akshata Murty.

Her father, NR Narayana Murthy, is India's sixth-wealthiest man thanks to his ownership of multinational business technology giant Infosys.

The couple married in her home city of Bangalore in 2009 in a two-day ceremony attended by 1,000 guests.

Ex-chancellor Sunak also opened up previously about the huge impact Stanford had on his academic life, teaching him to 'think bigger' instead of having a 'more incremental mindset'.

Yet when approached by DailyMail.com on Monday, Sunak appeared to have had little effect on the 137-year-old school, with his former professors admitting they had no words he could say about his student.

Irving Grousebeck said that he had ‘no recollection of him to share’, while Andy Rachleff added that he ‘does not’ remember the soon-to-be Prime Minister – who was one of 400 in his graduating class.

Several others also confirmed that they did not remember the new PM, with many saying they didn’t have any recollections other than a vague one of a ‘very bright’ student.

Sunak, who was not awarded a prize for being in the top 10 percent of the MBA class in 2006, made fast friends with several of his peers who have gone on to other high-flying jobs.

He met his wife Akshata while at the top University, with fellow students recalling the ‘power couple on campus’ in his biography penned by Lord Ashcroft.

Lord Ashcroft penned a biography of Sunak’s life, called Going for Broke, and detailed several students praising him as a ‘hard worker’.

One student, Maria Arguiano, told the author that Sunak was a ‘very positive’ person who ‘coped very well’ with the stresses of the course.

She added that Sunak and Akshata were ‘impact oriented people’, while Rashad Bartholomew said: ‘I do think they definitely complemented one another, they’re definitely a beautiful, powerful power couple, a good-looking couple, a smart couple.

‘And I definitely think that their hearts are in the right place.’

The book also details that while the ex-Chancellor did not drink, he would sometimes engage in games of poker where the winner would treat everyone to dinner.

Bartholomew added that Sunak was ‘well liked’ and ‘had his own crew’ while at the iconic US University, before transferring back across the pond to work at a lucrative hedge fund.

Sunak, the son of first generation immigrants from India to the UK, was head boy at Winchester College before studying at both Oxford and then Stanford – where he was granted a Fulbright Scholarship. 

Welcoming the news about their alumni, Stanford Graduate School of Business said: ‘On this historic occasion, Rishi Sunak, MBA ’06, will become the 57th Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

‘We wish the new Prime Minister, and his wife Akshata Murthy, MBA ’06, the best of luck as they embark on this new chapter.’

The UK's first – and only other – minority prime minister was Benjamin Disraeli, who was Jewish, in 1874.

Mr Sunak, 42, took over after challenger Penny Mordaunt pulled out of the leadership race with two minutes to go. She conceded at 1.58pm after failing to get 100 backers for her bid.

It caps a political journey that began seven years ago when he replaced William Hague in his Yorkshire seat at the 2015 election.

Mr Sunak only got his first ministerial job four years ago but became Chancellor of the Exchequer aged 39 in 2020.

He will become the youngest PM in the modern era to enter No 10, at the age of 42 – younger even than David Cameron in 2010 and Tony Blair in 1997.

His parents saved up to send him to the $42,000-per-year Winchester College, and he later went to Oxford, where he studied PPE.

Mr Sunak has previously spoken of how did the books at his mother's pharmacy in Southampton while he was growing up.

After the couple returned to Britain, Mr Sunak worked for a London hedge fund before setting up his own business, Theleme Partners, in 2010, with an initial fund of $700million.

He was based in the UK and the United States before entering politics and winning Richmond in 2015.

In April it was revealed he had held a US Green Card – which carries American residency and tax requirements – while in office.

But Lord Geidt, the adviser on ministerial standards, cleared Mr Sunak of wrongdoing after the chancellor referred himself for investigation.

There was also uproar over Ms Murty's tax status and her shareholding in her father's tech firm while living in a grace-and-favour apartment in Downing Street.

Ms Murty legally avoided a huge UK tax bill by paying £30,000 a year to register as being based in India.

The India-born 42-year-old later said she would give up her right to pay only 'international tax' on her foreign fortune.

The move, designed to save Mr Sunak's political career, is likely to cost Ms Murty millions of pounds a year in extra tax.

Mr Sunak insisted she hadn't 'done anything wrong' while accusing his critics of 'smearing her to get at him'.

In his May 2021 annual statement the independent adviser on ministers' interests said he had 'gone through the individual returns' of members of the Cabinet, including their tax affairs and the interests of their spouses.

He went on to say that 'any issues have been resolved to my satisfaction', suggesting he was happy with Ms Murty's tax status, her shareholding in Infosys and the Green Card.