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🔹 Actor-producer Riz Ahmed tops as most influential South Asian artist in GG2 Power List, profiling 101 influential Brits; Rishi Sunak, prime minister tops GG2 Power List and receives top GG2 Hammer Award at GG2 Leadership & Diversity Awards
🔹 Two visual artists Sir Anish Kapoor & Chila Burman also feature in the list
🔹 Other entertainment figures are Simone Ashley (actor); Romesh Ranganathan (presenter/comedian); Meera Syal and Sanjeev Bhaskar (acting); Nitin Sawhney (music); Anoushka Shankar (music); Krishnendu Majumdar (chair Bafta); Himesh Patel (actor); Charlie XCX (music); media figures listed below.
🔹 See our pictures from the evening on Instagram
RIZ AHMED has come out on top of entertainment figures on a list that profiles Britain’s 101 most influential South Asian Britons.
The actor and producer and activist is sixth on the list, sandwiched between one of the most powerful judges in the land, Justice Rubinder Singh (5) of the Court of Appeal in London. He is the judge who upheld the government’s controversial plan to send those arriving in small boats to Rwanda, deeming it to be legal. The ruling is now the subject of an appeal.
Ahmed is above another judge – Dame Bobbie Cheema-Grubb (7) is another leading legal figure, and sits in The High Court, and sentenced former policeman and rapist David Carrick for his 71 sexual offences against 12 different women.
While Sunak is the top of the list, Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, is no. 2. Home Secretary Suella Braverman (3), and eminent economist Professor Sir Partha Dasgupta (4), who has developed a system for assessing economic activity against environmental impacts, make up the top four.
The GG2 Power List was published on Tuesday (March 7) and released to guests at the annual GG2 Leadership and Diversity Awards – where 23 figures or organisations from across Britain’s people of colour ethnic communities were recognised for their achievements and contributions to British life.
While Rishi Sunak won the very highest award available – the Hammer, for breaking the proverbial glass ceiling, other figures from the world of sport, law, business and also organisations from the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (often referred to as ED&I sector) were also recognised.
Arsenal Football Club CEO Vinai Venkatasam was presented with the GG2 Man of the Year Award, as one of the few people of colour, in a position of power at one of the country’s biggest and most successful football clubs; divorce lawyer Ayesha Vardag was named GG2 Woman of the Year; her legal work has led to changes in divorce rulings in Britain – again, in a field where few women and women of colour operate. She made an impassioned acceptance speech, saying she had only just begun to talk about her Pashtun heritage and embracing her ethnicity completely, while building her hugely successful legal practice.
Simone Ashley, one of the stars of ‘Bridgerton’ is the next highest entertainment star at 10 on the GG2 Power List; broadcaster Amol Rajan is 16; comedian and TV presenter Romesh Raganathan is 17; Mohit Bakaya, at number 19, is the director of speech for the BBC, and has risen to this position after he was Controller of BBC Radio 4.
Meera Syal and Sanjeev Bhaskar are listed at 35; BBC Broadcaster Mishal Husain is no. 37; artist Chila Burman is 43; Music star Nitin Sawhney 45; Channel 4 news presenter Krishnan Guru-Murthy (51) is just outside the top 50. Artist Sir Anish Kapoor is at 53; BBC Radio 5 Live broadcaster Nihal Arthanayake (56), is just below Malala Yousefzai, who is emerging as a significant film producer – her short film, ‘Stranger at the Gate’ is up for an Oscar and she also has an executive producer credit on the Cannes Prize winning Pakistani feature, ‘Joyland’.
Musician Anoushka Shankar is at 58; ITV Political Editor Anushka Asthana is 61; Warner Brothers Discovery boss Priya Dogra is 63, she runs the global studio’s operations in Europe, Middle East and Asia.
BBC Broadcaster Reeta Chakrabarti is 64; Writer and journalist Sathnam Sanghera, the author of ‘Empireland’ is 68, while another BBC Broadcaster Anita Rani is 70; Bafta Chair Krishnendu Majumdar is 73; Actor Himesh Patel is 88; BBC sports presenter Isa Guha makes the list at 93. Pop star Charlie XCX is 100 (her mother is East African Indian Gujarati), and Indian chef Asma Khan and star of Netflix’s ‘Chef’s Table’ completes the list at 101.
The system of ranking for the Power List is decided by a committee of senior editors, executives and sector analysts.
GG2 is the English language edition of Garavi Gujarat, which was the first publication started by the late Asian Media Group chief, Ramniklal Solanki CBE. It continues to publish GG2, Garavi Gujarat and Eastern Eye, which it acquired in 2009, alongside other consumer and business to business titles both in the UK and US. The GG2 Leadership and Diversity Awards are now in their 24th year.
Pictures in reali time on Twitter (on March 7)
(To be updated)
https://gg2leadershipawards.co.uk/power-list-2023/
GG2 Leadership & Diversity Awards 2023 – https://gg2leadershipawards.co.uk/winners/winners-2023/
(To be updated)
https://gg2leadershipawards.co.uk/power-list-2023/
GG2 Leadership & Diversity Awards 2023 – https://gg2leadershipawards.co.uk/winners/winners-2023/
Find Print Edition of Eastern Eye with more about GG2 Power List
https://www.easterneye.biz/
