Who is U Po Kyin from Burmese Days and what is their importance?

U Po Kyin, born circa 1869, is a Subdivisional Magistrate of Kyauktada in Burma, at the time an English colony. The "U" in his name is an honorific. U Po Kyin is fifty-six years old and enormously fat—so fat, in fact, that he requires assistance to stand from a seated position. U Po Kyin views his own fatness as desirable and the metaphysical result of devouring the essence of the many people he has defeated in his climb to success.