CHANCELLOR Rishi Sunak said he grew up watching Bollywood films and the epic Indian mythological series Mahabharat, with Baywatch and Blind Date also included as part of his weekend viewing at the time.
“I watched Bollywood movies, but the big, defining TV thing for probably all Indian families was Mahabharat,” Sunak said in a Radio Times interview on Monday (31), adding that it was a big cultural moment in India. When it was shown in the UK, it took the best part of a year to watch and it was “a big deal, a very special thing”, the chancellor added.
Sunak said he and his wife, Akshata, have started reading bits of the epic to their daughters Krishna and Anoushka every Sunday night during the lockdown.
Last year, the chancellor placed lamps (diyas) outside his flat at 11, Downing Street, as the family celebrated Diwali during the lockdown.
Recalling his childhood days, Sunak revealed how his weekends were spent watching TV while eating on a picnic mat.
“We were never allowed to eat in the sitting room, but Saturday nights were the exception,” he said. “We would spread a plastic picnic blanket out and I’d go with my dad to pick up either Pizza Hut or KFC from Portswood in Southampton, and we – mum, dad and my younger brother and sister – would eat on this picnic mat and watch The A-Team, Baywatch and Blind Date, which were on one after the other.”
He also added Byker Grove, Blue Peter and Grange Hill as his most memorable childhood shows.
His current watchlist favourites show his “tastes are probably not quite the same” as some of his cabinet colleagues, Sunak admitted.
“Like ‘Emily In Paris.’ I’m not sure how many others watched that. I’ll check,” he said of the light-hearted Netflix series.
The 41-year-old added that he has also spent “a lot of time” during lockdown watching period drama Bridgerton, which was released in December on Netflix and became one of the platform’s most successful shows.
“The weekend TV is more Yorkshire and the weekday TV is more Downing Street,” said the chancellor. He represents Richmond, Yorkshire, in parliament.
Bob Blackman MP speaks during the event