Three countries share a common interest in warding off cyber attacks from various agencies PLA is developing and training in China.
A high-level committee set up to examine the gaps in the country's security system in the wake of the Kargil War in 1999 had called for appointment of a Chief of Defence Staff as a single-point military adviser to the defence minister.
Gen Rawat is due for retirement on December 31 and top government sources said, if everything goes according to plan, then the government would name him as the country's first CDS before he hangs up his boots.
Officers responsible for preparing budgets say their detailed costing projections are mostly ignored. The defence ministry simply takes the previous year's budgetary allocations for each service and adds a small percentage to those.
The CDS will be senior to the service chiefs and his primary role will be to work towards increasing operational coordination among the army, the navy or the air force and deal with India's national security with a comprehensive approach.
The CDS will be a four-star general and his salary will be equivalent to that of service chiefs.
'Earlier the planning process was services specific, with others coordinating. 'Now we shall have an apex leader backed by a structure, who is accountable to provide single-point advice, based on best of all options dependent on geographical and situational intrigue, and that too, after validation,' says General Anil Chait (retd), the former central army commander.
Given the importance of equipment modernisation, the overall defence budget should rise at least at the same pace as salaries and pensions, so that equipment modernisation is not hit.
'Defence does not new 'planning commissions'; it needs an implementation commission.'
Given Prime Minister Modi's emphasis on "sharp(ening) coordination" rather than "joint command", analysts are guessing that a four-star permanent chairman of the chiefs of staff committee is likely, with the title of CDS, if not the functions and five-star rank, reports Ajai Shukla. Ajai Shukla reports.
General Bakshi is understood to have been assured by Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar that the process was under way to appoint him as India's first tri-service commander, a post that would, at least nominally, place him senior to General Rawat.
'Since each chief single-mindedly pursues his service's interests in the competition for turf and in core matters such as budget share. The CDS, therefore, must act as an "honest broker" whose decisions serve the broader national purpose, rather than narrow service interests,' says Ajai Shukla.
Army Chief Gen Bikram Singh to be appointed chairman of chiefs of staff committee in January, Lt Gen Anil Chait to head army, say sources
India's cumbersome arms procurement procedures and a plodding Ministry of Defence bureaucracy have long been blamed for shortfalls in combat capability. Now there is another, more worrying, reason - a growing crisis of funds, magnified by the lack of tri-service coordination.
The defence minister has 20 months to learn the military's ethos, culture and to publicly bat for an organisation that feels increasingly marginalised and underappreciated.
An insecure political class, with little knowledge of the military, has unquestioningly internalised the fear that a powerful tri-service chief would threaten democracy, says Ajai Shukla.
The defence ministry has signed off on a national security plan that it cannot fund. Ajai Shukla reports
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