Next Army Chief Lt Gen Bipin Rawat

The government on Saturday night appointed Lt-General Bipin Rawat as the next army chief after General Dalbir Singh Suhag, superseding two Lt-Generals senior to him. The present Army chief will retire on December 31.


But sticking to the seniority principle in appointment of the next IAF chief, Air Marshal Birendra Singh Dhanoa will replace Air Chief Marshal Arup Raha on December 31.

Lt-General Bipin Rawat (infantry), who took over as the Army vice-chief in September 2016, has been appointed the new chief over Eastern Command chief Lt-Gen Praveen Bakshi (armored corps) and Southern Army Command chief Lt-Gen P M Hariz (mechanized infantry). While Lt-Gen Bakshi was commissioned in December 1977, Lt-Gen Hariz was commissioned in June 1978. Lt-Gen Rawat, in turn, was commissioned into the fifth battalion of the 11 Gorkha Rifles in December 1978.

A sword of honour winner at the Indian Military Academy, Lt-Gen Rawat has vast experience in high-altitude warfare and counter-insurgency operations. He commanded an infantry battalion along the Line of Actual Control with China, a Rashtriya Rifles sector in J&K and an infantry division in Kashmir Valley.

Even though it's well within the right of a government to appoint whoever it wants to be the next chief of the Army, IAF or Navy, successive dispensations have almost always followed the seniority principle to anoint the new military chief. Exceptions have been few and far between, like when Indira Gandhi superseded Lt-Gen S K Sinha to appoint Gen A S Vaidya as the Army chief in 1983. Similarly, Air Chief Marshal S K Mehra became IAF chief by superseding Air Marshal M M Singh in 1988.