Malala Yousafzai tops list of most powerful Asians in the UK

Malala Yousafzai has topped a list of the 101 most powerful British Asians and Asians resident in the UK, knocking Labour MP Keith Vaz off the number one spot he held last year.

Yousafzai, who came to Britain from Pakistan after she was shot in the head by the Taliban for campaigning for girls’ education, is the only woman to feature in the top ten.

She is joined in the top 20 by new Today programme presenter Mishal Husain, newsreader George Alagiah and One Direction member Zayn Malik.

The list, which has been compiled for the last three years, celebrates British Asians from all walks of life and this year honoured 17 people from the political sphere, including Baroness Sayeeda Warsi and Labour MP Sadiq Khan.

The power 101 was unveiled at a ceremony in London on Wednesday night attended by the likes of Nick Clegg and Asian MPs Alok Sharma and Paul Uppal.

Kalpesh Solanki, managing editor of the Asian Media and Marketing Group power list, said: ‘It’s fantastic to see so much ethnic success in Britain. There are a lot of strong, influential and powerful people whose hard work goes unrecognised.

“These awards ceremonies are highly significant as it’s incredibly important for us to keep recognising and rewarding ethnic achievements in the country.”

The list in full:

1. Malala Yousafzai (activist)

2. Keith Vaz (politician)

3. Lakshmi Mittal (industrialist)

4. SP & GP Hinduja (businessmen)

5. Sajid Javid (politician)

6. Anshu Jain (businessman)

7. Zayn Malik (musician)

8. Sadiq Khan (politician)

9. Dr Yusuf Hamied (businessman and scientist)

10. SP Lohia (businessman and philanthropist)

11. Shailesh Vara

12. Baroness Sayeeda Warsi

13. Alok Sharma

14. George Alagiah

15. Amartya Sen

16. Priti Patel

17. Paul Uppal

18. Rakesh Kapoor

19. Lord Navnit Dholakia OBE

20. Mishal Husain

21. Lord Paul & Angad Paul

22. Lord Rumi Verjee

23. Sir Suma Chakrabarti

24. Meera Syal MBE & Sanjeev Bhaskar OBE

25. Ranjit Boparan

26. Sir Anish Kapoor CBE

27. Rajesh Satija

28. Ameet Gill

29. Sir Anwar Pervez

30. Shami Chakrabarti CBE

31. Trustees of Neasden Temple

32. Sudhir & Bhanu Choudhrie

33. Nazir Afzal OBE

34. Anil Agrawal

35. Ivan Menezes

36. Rabinder Singh QC

37. Prof Tejinder Virdee

38. Baroness Sandip Verma

39. Ravi Chand OBE

40. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan

41. Archie Panjabi

42. Lord Dolar Popat

43. Kishore Lulla

44. Akeel Sachak,

45. Harpal Kumar

46. Sonny Takhar

47. Jameela Jamil

48. Krishnan Gurumurthy

49. MIA

50. Dr Kartar Lalvani & Family

51. Ashok Vaswani

52. Sir Salman Rushdie

53. Naughty Boy

54. Nirj Deva

55. Adil Ray

56. Riz Ahmed

57. Amol Rajan

58. Cecil Balmond

59. Akram Khan MBE

60. Amit Bhatia

61. Ritula Shah

62. Ruby McGregor-Smith

63. Rushanara Ali

64. Amir Khan

65. Nitin Sawhney

66. Amal Pramanik

67. Kuljinder Bahia

68. Arun Batra

69. Nihal Arthanayake

70. Manish Bhasin

71. Jay Sean

72. Sanjay Shabi

73. Jasminder Singh OBE

74. James Caan

75. Dr Rami Ranger

76. Imran Khan

77. Yasmin Alibhai Brown

78. Dr Chai Patel

79. Surinder Arora

80. Dipankar Bhattacharjee

81. Asif Kapadia

82. Cyrus Todiwalla

83. Janan Ganesh

84. Ruby Hammer

85. Farah Ramzan Golant

86. Anas Sarwar

87. Dr Kailash Chand

88. Virendra Sharma

89. Lord Gulam Noon

90. Manoj Badale

91. Lord Meghnad Desai & Kishwer Desai

92. Anita Anand & Simon Singh

93. Sailesh Mehta

94. Gurinder Chadha OBE

95. Indu Rubasingham

96. Lolita Chakrabarti

97. Cyrus and Priya Vandrevala

98. Lord Karan Bilimoria

99. Shabana Mahmood

100. Lord Ajay Kakkar

101. Prof Sugata Mitra