Lt Gen Anil Chauhan to fill Gen Rawat's boots as CDS : The new Chief of Defence Staff has his task cut out

Lieutenant General (Retired) Anil Chauhan is India's new and second Chief of Defence Staff (CDS). 61-year-old Chauhan is currently the military advisor to national security advisor Ajit Doval and the National Security Council Secretariat and will be carrying forward Late Gen Bipin Rawat's projects which were left incomplete owing to his untimely death in a helicopter crash.
The Centre has appointed Lieutenant General Anil Chauhan as the next Chief of Defence Staff (CDS). The Defence Ministry statement on Wednesday said, “The Government has decided to appoint Lt. Gen. Anil Chauhan (Retired) as the next Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) who shall also function as Secretary to Government of India, Department of Military Affairs with effect from the date of his assumption of charge and until further orders.”
61-year-old Lt. Gen. Anil Chauhan (Retired) is currently the military advisor to national security advisor Ajit Doval and the National Security Council Secretariat and was the former Eastern Army Commander.
According to the Ministry of Defence statement, Lt Gen Chauhan has held several command, staff and instrumental positions in his career spanning over four decades, besides having an extensive experience in counter-insurgency operations in Jammu and Kashmir and the Northeast.
Born on May 18, 1961, he joined the Indian Army in 1981 and was commissioned into the 11 Gorkha Rifles. Lt Gen Chauhan is an alumnus of the National Defence Academy, Khadakwasla (Pune), and the Indian Military Academy, Dehradun.
He had commanded an infantry division in the critical Baramulla sector in Kashmir under the Northern Command as a Major General and commanded a corps in the Northeast as Lieutenant General. He then went on to become the General Officer Commanding in Chief (GOC-in-C) of the Eastern Command in September 2019 and held the position until his retirement in May 2021.
With the new appointment, Lt-Gen Chauhan will be spearheading the entire process to build integrated war-fighting machinery with budgetary constraints through the creation of theatre commands and other structures.
The appointment comes nine months after India’s first CDS Gen Bipin Rawat died on December 8, 2021, in a helicopter crash. India’s first Chief of Defence Staff had initiated crucial reforms in the Indian defence structure and his untimely demise had hit the Indian military’s planned reforms — from modernisation to setting up theatre commands. The critically-needed reforms were stalled as the Centre was stalling appointing the next CDS, raising questions on the viability of the most far-reaching restructuring since the Independence, of the 15-lakh strong Indian armed forces.
Filling Gen Rawat’s big boots is not going to be a cakewalk for Lt Gen Chauhan as he has to now carry forward the ambitious reforms planned. The tri-Service chief has to bear the responsibility that Gen Rawat shouldered in creating the theatre commands by integrating the 17-odd separate commands of the three armed services (Army, Navy and the Air Force) into five operational commands. Of these, each command was to have the required components of three services — as per its requirements — to operate effectively, in both war and peace. With the creation of theatre commands, Gen Rawat also had to face considerable dispute within each service and their brass hats — a debate that remained unresolved till his death and will now fall on Lt Gen Chauhan’s shoulders.
End of Article