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  Changing boundaries: Trinity College, Cambridge

The question of whether Rahul Gandhi got a degree at all at Cambridge and the precise name under which he may have qualified reads like an Agatha Christie novel.

So much damning evidence appears stacked up against the prime suspect that the reader knows instinctively that there would be no story if he were eventually found guilty.

Members of the jury, the prosecution has drawn your attention to the certificate issued by Cambridge University. So let's take a closer look at it.

The Christian or first name on the certificate?

Mr Raul Vinci. Yes, 'Raul' and not 'Rahul'.

The certificate states he studied 'during the academic year 2004-2005'.

Look at the pass mark — 60 per cent.

And what did Raul get in Paper 5 (land econ), national economic planning and policy?

Only 58 per cent. So that means the man who intends one day to be in charge of India's economy has failed in a vital paper? Right?

No, wrong.

I can now tell you that Cambridge University has dismissed accounts based on the certificate that have appeared in some Indian newspapers as 'utterly incompetent and mendacious'.

The certificate was indeed issued by Cambridge but is not an official exam certificate.

The document was issued on '22 April, 2008' by the University of Cambridge Development Studies Committee. It was signed by Diana Kazemi, secretary, development studies.

It was headed, 'TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN', which is not something Cambridge generally puts on certificates. Most important, in issuing the document, Diana Kazemi made two bad mistakes.

Cambridge University has now stated: 'It is not the official exam certificate. It is in the public domain that Ms Kazemi, who is no longer employed by the university, made two key mistakes. She misspelt his 'Christian' name and she gave the year as 2005 rather than 1995. The university acknowledged this mistake in 2009 and (former vice-chancellor) Alison Richard wrote the oft quoted letter confirming Rahul Gandhi's degree status. Also at that time 58 was considered a pass. We are talking nearly 20 years ago and boundaries change.'

What this means is this: Rahul was wrongly spelt as 'Raul' — nothing more sinister. Back in 1994-95, the bar was set a little lower — 58 per cent was deemed a pass mark.

As already reported, the Red Book, the list of Cambridge University members, states that Rahul Gandhi of Trinity College got his MPhil in 1995 as: 'VINCI, Rahul T MPHIL95.'

Members of the jury, you are now directed to retire and consider your verdict.

Tigress wife

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  Once upon a time: (From left) Tony Blair, Rupert Murdoch, Wendi Deng and Cherie Blair

So much attention has been devoted to Vanity Fair's surrender to the London-based actress, Gwyneth Paltrow, that people have not noticed that the glossy magazine has also just published 'Seduced and Abandoned', an eight-page investigative article by writer Mark Seal on Wendi Deng.

Rupert Murdoch divorced his wife because he was convinced she was having an affair with Tony Blair. Despite its length, the article goes over familiar ground that has largely been covered by British and American newspapers.

The article says that Murdoch felt betrayed by Blair. 'After all, through the power of The Sun, and his other London newspapers, The Times and News of the World, Murdoch had virtually put Blair into office... From 1997 to 2007, the two men virtually ran Great Britain.'

In 2005, The Sun asked Blair the kind of question that, say, Manmohan Singh or Narendra Modi (but perhaps not N.D. Tiwari) would never be asked in India. Could he manage sex five times a night?

Blair boasted, 'At least. I can do it more, depending on how I feel.'

'Are you up to it?' Cherie was asked.

'He always is!' she snapped, Vanity Fair recalled.

In Britain, Blair's reputation is being shredded even though he won the 1997, 2001 and 2005 general elections. The allegations about his role in the 'illegal' Iraq War won't help nor last week's claim that he offered informal advice to senior Murdoch executive Rebekah Brooks on handling the phone-hacking scandal six days before her arrest.

Wendi, who comes across as a tigress with an insatiable appetite, would not be interviewed by Vanity Fair. Nor would Blair. But this looks like a bodice ripper that will grow in the telling and probably be made into a movie, 'Tony and Wendi and Rupert and Cherie'.

Father's son

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  Candid Indian: Rami Ranger

Once Indian businessmen have made their millions in Britain they don't like to be reminded of their humble origins.

But Rami Ranger, who is ranked 42nd in the Asian Rich List with personal wealth estimated at £32 million, is commendably frank in his just published autobiography, From Nothing to Everything: An inspiring saga of struggle and success from £2 to a £200 million business.

Rami, who runs two inter-linked firms — Sea Air & Land Forwarding and Sun Mark, a food and drinks business — has won five successive Queen's Awards for Enterprise and Director of the Year 2013 for a large company. He is frank about his desire for a peerage.

What I think is specially commendable about Rami is that he works for greater understanding between Indians and Pakistanis in the UK — remarkable given that his father, 'Shaheed' Nanak Singh, was butchered during Partition.

'Even though he was killed before I was born, his impact on my life has been enormous,' confides Rami (whose ghostwriter, Simon Wicks, has succeeded in capturing his subject's distinctive life).

Rami was born on July 3, 1947, into a Sikh family in Gujranwala (now in Pakistan), the youngest of eight children. After arriving in England on May 22, 1971, Rami had to do a series of modest jobs — 'my first job in England was of a car cleaner'.

He now pays due credit to his wife, Renu, whom he married in 1976 and who has been a rock in his life plus his business partner.

I find it charming that Rami includes pictures of himself with the Queen, Prince Charles, Margaret Thatcher, David Cameron, Boris Johnson, Shashi Tharoor and his current car: 'I am now fortunate enough to own a Rolls-Royce Ghost when once I could not afford a bicycle.'

Word trouble

In England if a former cricket captain described the current skipper's leadership skills on overseas tours as 'obnoxious', he would probably be asked for an explanation — and an apology.

Does Sourav, who used the word in relation to MSD, really know what it means — 'highly objectionable or offensive; odious; obnoxious behaviour'.

Many here are shocked.

Reel racism

Many Bengalis and even non-Bengalis in England are again watching old Uttam Kumar-Suchitra Sen movies following the recent death of the legendary actress. In the 1961 film, Saptapadi (The seven steps), Rina (Suchitra), an Anglo-Indian, initially disparages fellow medical student, Krishnendu (Uttam), as a 'blackie'.

Today, in England, at least, this kind of dialogue in a popular movie would simply fall foul of race relations legislation.

Tittle tattle

What excuse did former British PM Tony Blair, an athletic 60, give to his lawyer wife, Cherie, 59, when slipping out for an assignation with Wendi Deng, the beautiful but hungry 45-year-old wife of the powerful but ageing 'Viagra chomping' News Corp chairman, Rupert Murdoch, 82?

'Darling, I'm popping out for a Chinese,' according to a joke in questionable taste doing the rounds in London.