Chief of Defence Staff will have a wider horizon

New Delhi: The new Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) will look at border matters and border disputes with neighbouring countries with which India shares land borders including Pakistan and China.

He will be incharge of deployment of forces at borders and border intelligence with these countries.

Defence ministry has notified division of responsibilities bet-ween the department of military affairs under CDS and department of defence (DoD). CDS has been tasked  to look at administration of Siachen matters. He will also look at developments in Indian Ocean, Afghanistan, West Asia, Gulf countries and South East Asia. CDS will look at the military diplomacy. The incidents violation of borders  by neighbouring countries will be looked by CDS.

He will look into overseas deployment of Indian Navy’s ships, offshore security and anti-piracy operation on high seas.

CDS will look at apprehended foreign defence personnel and ex-gratia compensation for land mine casualties. CDS has been given charge of counter insurgency operations, the size, shape and composition of the Army and promotion matters. He will look at court martial and disciplinary cases for all Army officers/personnel. Human Rights violations cases referred by NHRC pertaining to discipline will come under CDS. He will look at missing personnel of army from 1965 and 1971 wars.

All matters relating to National Defence Academy(NDA), Indian Military Academy, Officers Training Academy and Defence Services Staff College will come under CDS. He will look after air defence including anti-aircraft protection.

In his first meeting as CDS, Gen Bipin Rawat had set out to create a common Air Defence Command to secure the country from aerial attacks. He had directed that a proposal to create Air Defence Command be prepared by June 30, 2020. CDS will look at all issues relating to violation of the Indian Airspace by the foreign aircraft, including reporting of such violations to MEA.