A popular DM, a sudden exit, an unanswered question

Today, I voluntarily resigned from the IAS, bringing an unforgettable 13-year journey to a close.” With those words, Divya Mittal announced on social media on Sunday that she was walking away from the civil services. The resignation of the 43-year-old, 2013-batch Uttar Pradesh-cadre officer, who was serving as special secretary in the revenue department, is yet to be formally accepted.Mittal has not disclosed why she quit, telling TOI that she will reveal her plans at the appropriate time. Her farewell post instead retraced her journey from IIT-Delhi and IIM-Bangalore to a job in London, and then back to India to repay what she called a “debt to this soil”.Why Her Exit Stunned ManyHer decision surprised colleagues and admirers because Mittal had acquired a public following unusual for a bureaucrat. In Mirzapur and Deoria, she became known as an accessible, hands-on administrator who used social media to communicate her work.Her best-known initiative brought piped water to Lahuriya Deh, a remote hilltop hamlet whose residents had long depended on tankers and water collected from pits. In her farewell note, Mittal recalled an elderly woman silently touching her head and blessing her when water reached the village.Village representatives also remember “Mera Gaon, Mera Gaurav”, a WhatsApp group connecting more than 800 pradhans with district officials. Mittal would tag officials when problems were raised and monitor the response, effectively giving village heads a direct line to the administration.Popular, but sometimes at oddsThose who worked with her describe two distinct sides to her administrative personality. She was soft-spoken and approachable with members of the public, but could lose her temper in official meetings when instructions were ignored. Her willingness to take decisions independently won her admirers, but it did not always make for easy relations with elected representatives.The completion of the Lahuriya Deh water project itself became a source of friction. Mittal performed the “jal puja” when water reached the village, but elected representatives were absent. Critics accused her of sidelining politicians; her supporters saw an administrator more interested in finishing the work than managing political optics.She was transferred from Mirzapur soon after the event and remained without a posting for several months.There had been confrontations earlier, too. During her tenure as Sant Kabir Nagar DM, Mittal found herself at odds with then district minister-in-charge Ashish Patel, husband of Union minister and Mirzapur MP Anupriya Patel, after she sent a representative to receive him instead of attending personally. As Deoria DM, differences during a District Development Coordination and Monitoring Committee meeting also generated controversy.Her visibility added another layer to the friction. In Deoria, she came to be known as the “reel wali DM” due to her frequent social-media posts on govt initiatives, community events and public outreach. Supporters saw it as an effort to make the administration more accessible. Detractors questioned whether the officer’s public profile was beginning to overshadow the institution she represented.From London to the IASSuch attention was far removed from the circumstances in which Mittal grew up. Born in Rewari, Haryana, she was raised in a modest household before her family moved to Delhi, which is listed as her home district in civil-service records.She studied engineering at IIT-Delhi between 2001 and 2005 and then attended IIM-Bangalore. After completing her management degree, she joined JPMorgan in London.Her husband, Gagandeep Singh Dhillon, had travelled much the same route a few years before her. He was Mittal’s senior at both IIT-Delhi and IIM-Bangalore and subsequently worked with Citigroup in London. The couple married in April 2007 and began their corporate careers in the UK.Despite well-paying jobs in international finance, they jointly decided to return to India in 2009 and prepare for the civil services. Mittal eventually joined the IAS in 2013. Dhillon entered the Indian Trade Service in 2011 and worked in areas including foreign trade and export controls.The parallel between their careers did not end there. In May 2022, Dhillon resigned from govt service and returned to financial markets. He now works as an algorithmic trader at Neuracap, according to his LinkedIn profile. Four years later, Mittal has followed him out of the civil services, although she has given no indication that she intends to return to finance.Former colleagues say Mittal’s ambition and appetite for difficult assignments were evident early in her career. Her batchmate Sunil Kumar Verma recalls that when delays arose in cadre allocation at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, Mittal and two other officers took on the technically demanding exercise themselves and completed it for the entire batch.Did she hit a plateau?Some senior officers who know her describe Mittal as an “over-achiever” and believe professional stagnation may have influenced her move. Having moved rapidly from elite academic institutions and international finance to demanding district assignments, she may have found the slower phases of a bureaucratic career frustrating, they say.Her transfer from Mirzapur, extended wait for another posting, and eventual move from Deoria DM to special secretary in revenue department form part of that reading. But it’s just that: an interpretation offered by colleagues, not an explanation confirmed by Mittal.She has said her resignation was neither impulsive nor due to pressure.Her interests outside administration offer some clues, though not necessarily an answer. Mittal is the author of, “The Crafted Genius”, a book about preparation, discipline and resilience. Her social-media posts frequently discuss parenting, while her writing has examined what formal education fails to teach — emotional regulation, communication, financial management, loneliness and mental health.What comes next?Mittal has indicated that writing, teaching and social service could be among the avenues she explores next.Politics is another possibility being discussed, particularly in Mirzapur, where her resignation has revived memories of her tenure. Abhinav Tripathi, pradhan of Dhawespur Kakrahi, says he would like Mittal to contest an election from the district and would contribute to her campaign if she did.The proximity of the 2027 UP assembly polls has inevitably added to that speculation. Mittal, however, has said nothing to suggest that a political debut is imminent.Her farewell note offers only one certainty: she may have surrendered the office through which she pursued her idea of public service, but she does not see herself as having surrendered the idea itself.“The position may be gone,” she wrote, “but the dream this country’s soil gave me will not leave me.”You Can Also Check: Gold Rate in Lucknow | Silver Rate in Lucknow | Bank Holidays in Lucknow | Public Holidays in Lucknow | Lucknow AQI | Weather in Lucknow | Petrol Price in Lucknow | Diesel Price in Lucknow | CNG Price in Lucknow | LPG Price in LucknowStay updated with the latest Lucknow news. Download the TOI App.