Gen Rawat to take over as Chairman COSC from outgoing IAF Chief

Army Chief General Bipin Rawat will take over as the new Chairman of Chiefs of Staff Committee (COSC) from the outgoing Air Chief BS Dhanoa.

The Air Chief who retires later this week will hand over the baton of Chairman COSC to the Army Chief tomorrow at 11 am.

The Chairman Chiefs of Staffs Committee is the seniormost officer in the three defence forces. This is probably the last such ceremony as the government is appointing a Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) who would become the seniormost defence officer in the country.

Dhanoa, a Kargil war veteran took over as the as Chairman, Chiefs of Staff Committee on June 1 this year succeeding former Navy Chief Admiral Sunil Lanba.

General Rawat was commissioned into Fifth Battalion, the Eleventh Gorkha Rifles of the Indian Army in December 1978, from IMA, Dehradun.

He commanded an Infantry battalion, along the Line of Actual Control in the Eastern Sector; a Rashtriya Rifles Sector; an Infantry Division in the Kashmir Valley; and, a Corps in the North East. He also commanded a Multinational Brigade, in a Chapter VII mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC). As an Army Commander, he commanded a theatre of ops along the Western Front.

Rawat assumed the appointment of the Chief of the Army Staff on December 31, 2016.