THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Water Authority Managing Director Bhandari Swagat Ranveer Chand will be quitting from the position following disputes with ruling and opposition unions. It has been only six months since Bhandari, who tried to steer the water authority in the right direction, took charge as MD. Bhandari, who is currently participating in the Chevening Gurukul Fellowship for Leadership & Excellence at Oxford University in Britain, will return on November 24. After that, she will write to Minister Roshy Augustine asking her to be removed from the post.

Bhandari had stated that she was not interested in continuing as MD in the meeting of Chief Engineers held before the foreign trip. If it goes like this, the water authority will become another KSRTC, she said. The MD made a serious allegation that the unions are not trying to improve the institution and stated that they are not getting any kind of support and cooperation from the unions. Hence, there is no point in continuing as MD, she said in the meeting.

Trying to work was the problem

After assuming office, the MD had clashed with ruling and opposition unions. This was due to an order issued in June doubling the number of meter readings to be taken per day. Kerala Kaumudi had reported that Bhandari, who went directly to take the readings when the unions complained of excessive workload, took 80 readings in three hours and disproved the arguments of the unions. However, the controversial order was frozen after intense pressure from the unions at the ministerial level. Another reason was that the job of geotagging the connections was given to the meter readers themselves to set a new target for meter reading. Unions joined hands against this too.

"The Luck of Kasaragod"

Bhandari Swagat is a native of Maharashtra and a 2010 batch IAS officer. Minister K Rajan described Bhandari as the 'The Luck of Kasaragod' when she was Collector of Kasaragod. She holds a Master's degree in Business Administration from Michigan Rose School of Business, US; a Master's degree in Public Policy from Indira Gandhi National Open University and a Bachelor's degree in Electronics Engineering from Mumbai University.