Warangal: Can New GWMC Commissioner, Pamela, pull off a miracle?

Warangal: The historic Warangal city could well be the right choice for Pamela Satpathy, 2014 Batch IAS, who has a diversified CV at a very young age, to take on the mantle of the Greater Warangal as the Municipal Commissioner, not to mention if she was at all allowed to settle and work for a considerable time.

Of late, hanging onto the civic chief post for a reasonable time was seen as a challenging task for her predecessors. Since the Warangal Municipal Corporation was accorded with Greater status in 2015, it has seen as many as five Commissioners - Sarfaraz Ahmad, Shahid Masood (FAC), Sruthi Ozha, VP Gautham and N Ravi Kiran. But for Sarfaraz Ahmad, who was promoted as District Collector of Karimnagar, the stint of all the other four ended abruptly, for reasons well known to the establishment. Since Ravi Kiran went on leave allegedly unable to cope with the pressure exerted by politicos, the government gave FAC (full additional charge) of GWMC to the Urban District Collector Prashanth Jeevan Patil a month ago.

The post of Municipal Commissioner, who is also the Vice-Chairman of Kakatiya Urban Development Authority (KUDA), is crucial in the context of development works in Warangal such as Smart City, Heritage City Development and Augmentation Yojana (HRIDAY), Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT), and Rs 300 crore per annum special development funds from the State Government.

It's alleged that Commissioners in the past were not allowed a free hand in discharging their duties competently. If, at one hand they had to deal with the staff crunch, on the other hand they had to deal with the pressure exerted by the political forces.

Especially, what hurt them was the undue interference of the leaders in the administration whenever they had initiated actions against the officials who were corrupt or lethargic. It may be mentioned here that there are 719 employees working with the GWMC presently as against the sanctioned posts of 1,512. Some key posts such as superintending engineer, city planner and chief medical officer are also in the hands of in-charges.

Against this backdrop, Pamela, a computer science techie with a diversified CV that includes academic and career virtuoso, who is to take charge as the Municipal Commissioner in a day or two, has her task cut out to set the house in order.

Prior to this appointment, Pamela, who hails from Sunabedi in Koraput district of Odisha, Director Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation & Resettlement. She had also worked as Project Officer & Additional District Magistrate, Integrated Tribal Development Agency, Executive Officer Sri Sita Ramachandra Swamy Temple, Sub-collector & Sub Divisional Magistrate, Bhadrachalam.

Before she cracked the Civil Services, she worked as an Assistant Professor with Siksha O Anusandhan University, Scientist fellow with Council of Scientific and Industrial Research and Software Engineer with Infosys. Pamela's husband Deepankar Satapathy is medical doctor.