Air Chief Marshal Chaudhari may head service chiefs’ panel
NEW DELHI: Indian Air Force (IAF) chief Air Chief Marshal Vivek Ram Chaudhari is expected to take over as the officiating chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee (COSC) shortly and in that capacity, he will be responsible for promoting synergy, cooperation and jointness among the three services in the absence of a chief of defence staff (CDS), officials familiar with the development said on Monday, asking not to be named.
Chaudhari became the seniormost commander in the Indian armed forces after General Manoj Mukund Naravane retired as army chief on April 30. Naravane took charge as the officiating chairman of COSC after India’s first CDS General Bipin Rawat was killed in a helicopter crash near Coonoor in Tamil Nadu on December 8, 2021.
The CDS’s post has been vacant for almost five months as the government is yet to name Rawat’s successor.
“The IAF chief will take over as officiating chairman of COSC in the coming days as he is the senior-most service chief. He will be responsible for synergy, cooperation and jointness among the three services till the government appoints the next CDS,” said one of the officials. Before the government created the post of CDS and the department of military affairs (DMA) in December 2019, the senior-most service chief held the charge of chairman of COSC and was responsible for interservices cooperation.
The erstwhile structure for interservices cooperation was considered weak as the chairmanship of COSC kept rotating, and chiefs often headed the committee for barely a few months before their retirement. The government expected Rawat, who took charge as CDS on January 1, 2020, to bring about jointness among the three services in a three-year time frame, by January 2023. One of the means to achieve jointness is the setting up of integrated theatre commands.
Chaudhari is set to take over as officiating chairman of COSC at a time when India is working on a road map for the military’s theaterisation to best utilise the resources of the three services for future wars and operations. Rawat was spearheading the theaterisation drive, and his demise was seen as a setback to the ongoing military reforms.
With General Naravane having retired, a new officiating chairman of COSC will now be appointed. In the absence of a CDS, this is an appropriate arrangement, but could further impact the military reform process that is the primary mandate of the CDS, said former Northern Army commander Lieutenant General DS Hooda (retd).
“We do hope that the government takes a quick decision on the CDS so that restructuring proposals that are in the pipeline can be finalised,” Hooda said.