Rishi Sunak looked set to spend at least a few years in the political wilderness after helping to overthrow ex-Prime Minister Boris Johnson but then losing to Liz Truss in the Conservative leadership contest in the summer.

But her dramatic political implosion after just 44 days in office has presented the Tory MP with an almost immediate opportunity to run again to become Britain’s first black prime minister.

It would be a historic milestone if the Hindu descendant of immigrants from the old British empire in India and East Africa took command of the world’s fifth largest economy – albeit one gripped by a deep crisis.

But after securing the support of more than 100 Conservative MPs and then officially announcing his candidacy on Sunday, he came a step closer to that reality.

Standing in his way are former boss-turned-political-foe Johnson – with whom he fell out in spectacular fashion earlier this year – and fellow Conservative Penny Mordaunt, as well as another potential party member vote.

Sunak failed to convince the base that he was a better option than Truss in the summer leadership contest. But after correctly predicting that their economic agenda would spark economic turmoil, he can hope for more success the second time around.

However, Johnson remains a favorite of party loyalists and some members view his former Treasury Secretary as an ambush, making any such vote very tense for Sunak.

Fabulously wealthy since his pre-political career in finance, he has been ridiculed as if he had no connection with Brits struggling with decades of inflation.

During the summer election campaign, he wore expensive Prada loafers on a visit to a construction site and was accused of mansplaining Truss.

Video footage also surfaced of a 21-year-old Sunak describing his mix of friends after studying at Winchester College, one of the UK’s most exclusive private schools, and the University of Oxford.

“I have friends who are aristocrats, I have friends who are upper class, I have friends who are, you know, working class,” he said, before adding, “Well, not working class.”

Sunak, 42, is a detail-oriented politician with a background in economics and will market himself as a stable choice in times of crisis.

An early supporter of Brexit, he took over as Chancellor of the Exchequer in February 2020 – a baptism of fire for the rising Tory star as the Covid pandemic hit.

He’s been forced to churn out a massive economic support package at breakneck speed, which he now has to pay off with solid financial plans.

Sunak is better known in India through his wife Akshata Murty. She is the daughter of Indian tycoon Narayana Murthy, the billionaire co-founder of information technology group Infosys.

The Sunaks met while studying in California and have two young daughters and a photogenic dog.

The ex-minister’s Instagram-friendly profile earned him the media nickname “Dishy Rishi”.

Until last year, he held a US green card – which critics say indicates a lack of long-term loyalty to the UK.

And he has been dogged by difficult questions about Murty’s failure until recently to pay UK taxes on its Infosys earnings, which opinion polls show voters are deeply displeased with.

Sunak was also harmed by the scandals of Johnson’s tumultuous premiership.

He was fined by police for breaking Covid rules after attending a birthday party for the then Prime Minister when he arrived early for a Downing Street meeting.

Johnson was also fined after investigations into the “Partygate” affair.

Coupled with the controversy surrounding his family fortune, the scandal tarnished the reputation of teetotaler Sunak, who admits to only having a taste for Coca-Cola and sugary confectionery.

Sunak represents the Richmond constituency in Yorkshire, northern England – a safe Conservative seat he took over in 2015 from former party leader and Foreign Secretary William Hague, who described it as “extraordinary”.

As a member of parliament, Sunak swears his oath of allegiance to the Bhagavad Gita. Theresa May gave him his first government job in January 2018, making him junior minister for local government, parks and troubled families.

Sunak’s grandparents were originally from Punjab in northern India and emigrated to Britain from East Africa in the 1960s.

They arrived with “very little,” Sunak told MPs in his inaugural address in 2015.

His father was a family doctor in Southampton on the southern English coast and his mother ran a local chemist – a backstory he kept telling during the election campaign.

Sunak served tables at a local Indian restaurant before moving to Oxford and then Stanford University in California.

He insists both his own family’s experience and that of his mega-rich wife are a “very conservative” story of hard work and aspirations.

He will soon find out whether the party members can be persuaded on second questioning.