DAVANGERE: From coding to the hospitality industry to administering a gram panchayat, Swathi Thippeswamy’s plate is full of variety. The software engineer was elected Gram Panchayat president in Jagalur taluk in Davanagere. Hailing from Sokke village, the engineering graduate from PESIT, Bengaluru, took the regular software route to the United States, where she spent five years.
She has now returned to Sokke, where four generations of her family have been part of the local administration. Swathi, who won from the third ward of Sokke village, was till recently a resident of Bengaluru, where she was running a hotel successfully. It was a call from her retired bureaucrat father Thippeswamy that made her shift gears and enrol in the voters’ list in the village, and get elected. The post of GP chief was reserved for woman (general).
Swathi says her priorities are education and health, and she is determined to improve infrastructure like drinking water, street lighting, develop public toilets and ensure security for girls. “The election has given me an opportunity to serve my ancestors’ village,” Swathi told TNIE. She recollected the services of her family -- ancestors Thippaiah, G Maddanaiah and KM Kottraiah -- who had served the village well.
With her children studying in Bengaluru, Swathi hopes to shuttle between Sokke and the state capital, a distance of 250km. She said she would stay at her ancestors’ home for at least four days a week. In this digital era, technology will help me in administration, she said. She wants to transform the village using her technological expertise, and rope in corporates to transform the small GP, comprising four villages.
Asked about corruption in the electoral process, Swathi said she had not spent any money on her election and that corruption would lead to disaster in the country. She advised the educated public to join politics, so that administration can be clean and corruption-free.