Infosys to end operations in Moscow as Rishi Sunak urges it to ‘confess’ to family stake in IT company Business News

Indian IT company Infosys, in which Rishi Sunak’s wife holds shares worth hundreds of millions of pounds, is to shut down its operations in Russia following pressure over its continued presence in the country amid Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine.

The company must stop its activities in Moscow, where it would have nearly 100 employees, The Independent understand.

Mr Sunak has been repeatedly questioned about his family ties to the business, which was founded by the Chancellor’s father-in-law and in which his wife, Akshata Murthy, has a 0.91 per cent stake worth estimated at nearly £700 million.

Earlier on Friday, Labor leader Sir Keir Starmer urged Mr Sunak to “confess” whether his family had benefited from Russia-linked interests since the invasion of Moscow.

Lesia Vasylenko, a Ukrainian MP, said this week that profits made by a company operating in Russia should be considered “blood money”.

Infosys declined to comment on the shutdown of its Moscow operations, but sources told the BBC the company was looking for replacement positions abroad for its staff in Russia.

In a statement earlier this week, the company said it had less than 100 staff in Moscow serving global customers based in Russia.

“We do not have active business relationships with local Russian companies,” the company’s statement said.

Founded in 1981 by Narayana Murthy and six other engineers, Infosys is now one of India’s largest companies, employing some 267,000 people in more than 50 countries.

After serving as CEO, Mr. Murthy left the Board in 2012 to take up the position of Chairman Emeritus.

Speaking to the BBC News On Thursday, Mr Sunak said he felt ‘nothing but enormous pride and admiration for all that’ his father-in-law has achieved and that ‘no amount of defamation will make me change that’.

The Chancellor – who has previously told UK businesses to “think very carefully” about any investment potentially beneficial to Mr Putin’s regime – denounced the questioning he has faced in recent days, calling it “very upsetting and , I think, wrong for people to try to go after my wife”.