Oxford - The Oxford mathematics professor bailed in the suspicious death of Professor Steven Rawlings, is a 'dead ringer' for former Channel 4 restaurant backer Nippi Singh.
Dr Devinder Sivia, 49, bears an uncanny facial similarity to the co-star of A Place In France: An Indian Summer which showcased the shambolic renovation of a derelict farmhouse in Les Fabres, near the Vals les Bains spa town in the Ardèche.
The project bombed and Singh together with UK documentary maker Nigel Farrell eventually opened an equally shambolic curry restaurant in a nearby property after the refurb project hit the rocks.
It was an unparallelled disaster as the pair quickly found out when French rural gastropods - er...gastronomes! - blackballed the eatery.
"Dr Sivia does not do UK docu-soaps about late night curry takeaways," a former mathematics student twittered today.
"Any facial resemblance to Nippi Singh is purely co-incidental."
Professor Rawlings was 60 years old.
