British finance minister Rishi Sunak has accused critics of mounting a “smear” campaign against his wealthy Indian wife, whose substantial foreign earnings are shielded from UK taxes. The Labour opposition accused Sunak of “breathtaking hypocrisy” after he raised taxes on ordinary Britons in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis. But the chancellor of the exchequer told Friday’s edition of The Sun newspaper that “to smear my wife to get at me is awful”. Sunak, once a leading contender to succeed Prime Minister Boris Johnson, has seen his popularity plummet in recent weeks as consumer prices surge across the board. His wife Akshata Murty, daughter of Indian billionaire N. R. Narayana Murthy, confirmed this week that she is “treated as non-domiciled for UK tax purposes”.