In 2001, a 21-year-old Rishi Sunak sat on a lush, brocade couch in his family home and talked to the BBC about his privileged upbringing. 

The broadcaster was making a documentary about the rise of the middle class. 

Once a tiny section of British society sandwiched between the aristocracy and the sprawling working class, the middle had expanded from the 19th century to become a moneyed, upwardly mobile majority. 

Sunak, the son of a GP and a pharmacist, who was head boy at the ancient boarding school Winchester College before going to Oxford, was the face of the modern British middle class. 

When asked about his social circle, Sunak gave a response that would come back to haunt him two decades later. 

"I have friends who are aristocrats, I have friends who are upper class, I have friends who are working class," he said. 

But he quickly corrected himself. 

"Well, not working class," he admitted, and his father chuckled. 

"I mix and match, then I go to these kids in inner-city state schools and tell them to apply to Oxford, and talk to them about people like me. 

"And then I shock them at the end of chatting to them for half an hour and tell them I was at Winchester and my best friend is from Eton or whatever, and then they're like, 'oh, OK'."

The footage probably didn't elicit more than a few eye-rolls among the BBC audience in 2001. 

But in 2022, it resurfaced and promptly went viral.

"No understanding of normality at all," one person tweeted.

"It's the privilege and entitlement of the few that is the root of so much economic and social injustice of the many in this country," posted another.

The clip emerged on the same day that Sunak announced his intention to run in the Tory leadership election to replace Boris Johnson.

In the weeks leading up to his resignation, the outgoing prime minister's reign had become an unending soap opera of scandal, illicit parties and controversy.

Sunak, his youthful chancellor, was viewed by many of his political enemies as the Brutus who plunged the knife in Julius Caesar's back by resigning on July 5.

Now Sunak was running to replace him.

The two-decade-old clip of a plummy-voiced boy admitting the limits of his social circle raised the ire of the British public, who had experienced more than a decade of Tory government.

As the cost of living spiralled to dizzying heights, the prospect of another fantastically wealthy PM was intolerable to many.

His supporters said the disapproval of some Tories over his privileged background — a status he shared with the vast majority of his colleagues — was a sign of a "bit of latent racism" in certain corners of the party.

He would be passed over for Truss, a libertarian who kept her hands clean during the coup against Johnson and won over the grassroots of the party by moulding herself in the image of Margaret Thatcher.

But with Truss ousted and only the ignominy of being Britain's shortest-serving PM to show for it, Sunak found himself the last man standing. 

Privilege aside, Sunak will make the history books

Sunak — one of the richest men in the House of Commons — may not be breaking the Tory tradition of elevating Oxford-educated elites, but his leadership will be historic.

He will be Britain's first prime minister of colour. 

His background as the Hindu son of Indian migrants, who split his weekends between worshipping at the temple and his local football club, is one that matters to him.

"British Indian is what I tick on the census, we have a category for it. I am thoroughly British, this is my home and my country, but my religious and cultural heritage is Indian," he told India's Business Standard in 2015. 

Both Sunak's maternal and paternal grandparents hailed from Punjab, relocating to colonial East Africa — now Kenya and Tanzania — before migrating to the UK in the 1960s.

His parents, Usha Berry and Yashvir Sunak, married in 1977 and settled down in the port city of Southampton, where they raised their three children: Rishi, Sanjay and Raakhi.

Sunak has often pointed out that his parents "sacrificed a great deal so I could attend good schools",explaining that the fees — now more than 45,000 pounds per year — were a stretch.

The family found a way, and his brother Sanjay soon joined Rishi at Winchester.

"My parents emigrated here, so you've got this generation of people … they've come to this country to make a life," he told the BBC in 2019. 

The future leader felt he stuck out somewhat in his early days at Winchester College, donning second-hand uniforms while rubbing shoulders with sons of 'Old Wykehamists'. 

But Sunak describes his school years as an "intellectually transforming" experience that "put me on a different trajectory" — one that would take him to Oxford, Stanford, and eventually, Number 10.

Winchester's first head boy of Indian heritage would go on to blaze something of a trail in the whitest institutions in the land.

When he first fought to represent the Conservatives in Richmond, Yorkshire, Sunak was described as a rank outsider in the predominantly white, rural constituency. 

But he won the seat, previously held by former party leader William Hague, with more than 50 per cent of the vote. 

"To be honest, I think it's patronising to assume minorities should only run in minority seats," he told Tatler at the time.

Sunak has largely opted to deflect the casual racism levelled at him in his rise to public office, laughing off a campaign interaction with a local farmer who observed "this one's got a nice tan".

In the years since, Sunak has often retold the anecdote, and even joked that he and his wife represented the entire immigrant population of Richmond.

But other encounters are not as easily brushed off. Describing the first time he recalls being targeted with a racist slur as a teenager, Sunak told the BBC "it seared in my memory". 

"I was just out with my younger siblings, we were out at a fast food restaurant and there were people sitting nearby ... just saying some very unpleasant things. The P-word. And it stung," he said.

Even as Sunak was mulling a second tilt at the leadership last week, public debate about his fitness for office descended into familiar farce.

A talkback radio segment in which a Conservative voter quipped, "Rishi's not going to win it, Rishi's not even British", has racked up millions of views on social media.

Host Sangita Myska was quick to fact-check the caller's claims and question the true intent behind his comments.

"Is the real problem here, Jerry, that Rishi Sunak is a brown man and you don't trust him at the top of this country?"

Though Sunak expects to encounter critics who may reduce him to his ethnicity, it's not something he's ever chosen to focus on. 

"I always consider myself professional middle-class, I don't think being Asian is a defining feature," he told the 2001 BBC documentary.

The hedge fund manager and his billionaire wife

The rise of Rishi Sunak has been described as a "dazzling success story". 

His transformation from Goldman Sachs finance guy to one of the richest MPs in Westminster, to the second-youngest chancellor of the exchequer in British history occurred in just five years. 

His wife Akshata Murthy, an heiress to her father's multi-billion-dollar IT fortune who made her own money as a fashion designer and venture capitalist, took the "middle class" boy from the BBC documentary to lofty new heights.

This year, their combined fortune, estimated at 730 million pounds ($AU1.3 billion), landed them on the UK Sunday Times rich list.

The couple owns a portfolio of four homes estimated to be worth $26 million, including a Santa Monica penthouse apartment that features ocean views and a "pet spa".

When Boris Johnson tapped Sunak in early 2020 to be his finance chief, the relatively unknown young politician turned heads. 

Nicknamed "Dishy Rishi" by the tabloids, he enjoyed better approval ratings than any other senior member of Johnson's cabinet.

He was credited with saving the British economy from catastrophe during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, pouring millions into loans and grants packages in a bid to avert a major recession.

However, his 'Eat Out To Help Out' program, which gave Brits dinner vouchers so they could go to restaurants and help prop up the ailing hospitality industry, was later blamed for an outbreak of cases. 

The scandal fed into a narrative that Sunak, who kept a $320 'smart mug' with the ability to track his caffeine intake on his desk, cared only about the rich.

The situation became even worse when it emerged that his wife may have avoided paying up to $35 million in UK tax on her overseas income, potentially by taking advantage of foreign tax havens.

"To smear my wife to get at me is awful. She loves her country like I love mine," Sunak said.

Two days later, Akshata Murthy reversed course and promised to pay tax in the future out of a "British sense of fairness".

But the biggest scandal was yet to come.

A brush with Partygate, then the final straw

In late 2021, it emerged that a year earlier, when Brits were planning Christmases away from loved ones due to another COVID wave, Johnson and his allies had been having little get-togethers at Downing Street. 

While Brits were forced to attend funerals for their dearly departed via Zoom, the PM's staff were gathering for "Wine Time Fridays".

Sunak was soon sucked into the Partygate scandal.

As children around the UK spent their birthdays away from their friends, the prime minister's wife threw a surprise celebration for his 56th birthday with up to 30 guests.

Among them was Sunak, though he and other ministers insisted they were there for a meeting and were "ambushed with cake".

Sunak paid the $89 fine for breaching COVID lockdown rules, and said that he "deeply regrets the situation and anger caused and I am sorry".

While the revelations unleashed a howl of outrage in a kingdom that had barely made it through a devastating and traumatic pandemic, Johnson refused to step down.