Om Prakash Rajbhar, Uttar Pradesh cabinet minister and Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP) president, was perhaps not far off the mark when he recently remarked that becoming an IAS officer maybe easier than contesting an election and becoming an MLA. Rajbhar’s observation came in the wake of the resignation by 2013-batch IAS officer Divya Mittal, who left the service to become, as she put it, the “unheard voice of the people”.

Mittal, whose career path included IIT Delhi and IIM Bangalore and a stint in the corporate sector in London, has said she will enter politics in UP even though her home state is Haryana. She said she plans to work with ordinary citizens and build a new platform around issues including education, corruption, employment and delays in delivering justice. Mittal so far hasn’t made public any plan to join parties like the BJP, SP, BSP and Congress. The state is also crowded with innumerable tiny caste-based parties though their influence limited to a region or a district.

Will she be successful? Or will her dreams of serving the people from a political pedestal fall flat?

The power dilemma: Who actually delivers?

Mittal’s transition has once again thrown open a broader debate on who actually wields power to take decisions and deliver results. And how far is it feasible for a bureaucrat to win elections without jonining a mainstream party?

Mittal is not the first bureaucrat to quit bureaucracy and join politics. She’s unlikely to........

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