A Tory donor who funded Rishi Sunak’s private jet travel is being taken to court over allegations of unauthorised business deals that made his sister millions of pounds, it has been revealed.
Entrepreneur Akhil Tripathi, who made his fortune inventing an anti-snoring device, has donated more than £150,000 to the Conservative party since 2021.
He funded £38,500 worth of the prime minister’s travel to the Scottish and Welsh Tory conferences, on board an Embraer Legacy 500 private jet.
Mr Tripathi is being taken to court in a civil case, according to the i. The entrepreneur is facing allegations over business dealings he carried out when he was chief executive of the company he founded to market his snoring device, Signifier Medical Technologies (SMT), it said.
Court papers show he is facing allegations over payments of “tens of millions” to his sister.
Investors claim he facilitated the sale of his sister’s stake in the company without telling the board or highlighting that the seller was his sister.
Mr Tripathi, who attended a Downing Street reception at which Mr Sunak was present in April, denies failing to disclose that his sister sold her shares. He also reportedly claims he was not asked about his relationship throughout the sale’s due diligence process.
Other claims include that Mr Tripathi sold SMT shares owned by a close friend, and that he more than doubled the salaries of two senior managers without the approval of the company’s board.
The court documents also accuse the entrepreneur of failing to disclose a potential conflict of interest between himself and a “close connection”.
Mr Tripathi has donated a total of £153,475 to the Conservative Party, Electoral Commission figures show.
Mr Sunak is relying on a dwindling pool of mega-donors ahead of next year’s general election as support for the Conservative Party dries up.
Recent Electoral Commission data revealed that the Tories received £15.4m in donations between July and September including a £10m bequest from the former boss of Sainsbury’s.
Mr Sunak has previously faced transparency questions over donations from multimillionaire Mr Tripathi. The PM declared that the £38,500 cost of air travel was funded by Balderton Medical Consultants, which is based in a property ultimately owned by Mr Tripathi.
The original entry for Mr Sunak’s declaration of the donation listed Mr Tripathi, but this was later changed to cite Balderton instead.
A spokeswoman for Mr Tripathi told the i: “Mr Tripathi has made a number of donations to the Conservative Party in a personal capacity, including for the costs of air travel for the Prime Minister and colleagues on 28 April 2023.”
Downing Street declined to comment.
