Vice Chief of Army Staff Lt Gen Manoj Pande has been named the 29th Chief of Army Staff, making him the first officer from the Corps of Engineers as well as the first from the combat support arms – infantry, artillery, and armored – to command the 1.3 million-strong Army. When current Gen Manoj Naravane retires on April 30, he will take over.
The office of the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), which has been vacant since the unfortunate death of the country’s first CDS Gen Bipin Rawat in a chopper crash in December, is yet to be filled. Gen Naravane is now the most senior and leading candidate for the position.
Service Chiefs serve for three years or until they reach 62 years of age, whichever comes first, but the CDS is limited to 65 years of age and has no set term.
Lt Gen Manoj Pande was commissioned into the Corps of Engineers
Lt Gen Manoj Pande was commissioned into the Corps of Engineers in December 1982. (The Bombay Sappers). He was the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Eastern Command, before becoming Vice Chief on February 1. He was the 15th Commander-in-Chief of the Andaman and Nicobar Command from June 1 to January 31. (CINCAN).
All three Service Chiefs will come from the National Defence Academy’s 61st Course after he takes over as Chief (NDA).
Lt Gen Manoj Pande is a graduate of the Staff College in Camberley, United Kingdom, as well as the Army War College at Mhow and the National Defence College (NDC) in Delhi. He was assigned to the United Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea as Chief Engineer.
During Operation PARAKRAM in the Pallanwala Sector of Jammu and Kashmir, along the Line of Control, the General Officer commanded the 117 Engineer Regiment (LoC). He commanded an Engineer Regiment along the LoC, an Engineer Brigade as part of the Strike Corps, an Infantry Brigade along the LoC, a Mountain Division in Western Ladakh’s high altitude region, and a Corps deployed along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) as well as in the North East’s counter-insurgency operations area. Colonel Commandant of the Bombay Sappers, Lt Gen Pande is also the Colonel Commandant of the Bombay Sappers.