Parameshwaran Iyer, key player behind the Centre’s flagship Swachh Bharat Mission, has resigned as Secretary of the Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation at the Jal Shakti Ministry.
The Appointments Committee of Cabinet accepted his resignation with effect from August 21, according to an official statement on Monday.
Mr. Iyer’s colleagues at the Ministry said he had quit for personal reasons to spend time with his family who are in the U.S. Some officials expressed surprise at the timing given that he had received a one-year extension of his contract until April 2021. Mr. Iyer did not respond to requests for comment.
The Secretary is a former IAS officer who took voluntary retirement in 2009 to join the World Bank’s global water and sanitation programme. In 2016, he was invited to rejoin the government on a contractual basis and head the Swachh Bharat initiative, which Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched with great fanfare two years earlier.
A community movement-based approach
Mr. Iyer led the effort to build more than 10 crore toilets across rural India, in time to declare the entire country open-defecation free on October 2, 2019. From appointing village-level swachhagrahis to recruiting Bollywood star Akshay Kumar to enter a twin pit himself for a memorable photo-op, Mr. Iyer spearheaded a community movement-based approach to sanitation that has garnered global admiration.
He had recently been appointed to head the Centre’s new flagship scheme, the Jal Jeevan Mission, which aims at bringing clean drinking water connections to every household in rural India. During the COVID-19 lockdown, Mr. Iyer headed the group of bureaucrats tasked with ensuring that key supply chains stayed open.
