Lt Gen Manoj Pande: Here's All You Need To Know About India's Next Army Chief

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Lieutenant General Manoj Pande will succeed General Manoj Mukund Naravane as the 29th Chief of the Indian Army (who will retire at the end of April 2022). Since 1 February, he has been Vice Chief of Army Staff.

Lt General Pande will be the first officer from the Corps of Engineers to become the COAS.

[image source: tribuneindia]

Who Is Lt. General Pande?

• He is an alumnus of the National Defence Academy (NDA), Khadakwasla, and the Indian Military Academy (IMA), Dehradun.
• The general has commanded an engineer brigade in the western theatre, an infantry brigade along the Line of Control (LoC), a mountain division in the Ladakh sector, and a corps in the northeast.
• Lt. General Pande commanded the 117 Engineer Regiment on the Line of Control (LOC) in Jammu and Kashmir. He commanded the unit during Operation Parakram.
• He has served as a Brigade Major of a Mountain Brigade in the North-East, Assistant Military Secretary (AMS) in the Military Secretary's Branch, and Brigadier General Staff (Operations) at the Eastern Command headquarters.
• Lt General Pande had also served as the Eastern Army Commander before taking over as the army's vice chief.
• He was also the commander-in-chief of the Andaman and Nicobar Command (CINCAN) from June 2020 to May 2021.
• He was the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Eastern Command, from June 2021 to January 2022.
• He will be the senior-most officer when General Naravane retires.
• Lieutenant General Manoj Pande has been conferred with the Param Vishisht Seva Medal, Ati Vishisht Seva Medal, and Vishisht Seva Medal, the Chief of Army Staff Commendation and twice with GOC-in-C Commendation.
• He has served as Chief Engineer in the United Nations mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea.

[image source: Wikipedia]

Lt. General Pande: Personal Life And Background

• Lt. General Pande hails from Nagpur, Maharashtra.
• He is the son of Dr C G Pande, retired Head of the Department of Psychology of Nagpur University, and Prema Pande, host of All India Radio and announcer in a Marathi family.
• After his schooling at Somalwar high school, he joined the National Defence Academy (NDA), where he graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Science.
• He attended the Staff College, Camberley, in the United Kingdom.
• Lt. General Pande was commissioned into the Bombay Sappers, one of the regiments in the Corps of Engineers, in December 1982.
• Upon graduating from the NDA, he joined the Indian Military Academy (IMA) and was commissioned as an officer. He then attended the College of Military Engineering, Pune, earning a Bachelor of Technology in Civil Engineering.
• He married Archana Salpekar, a gold medalist from Govt Dental College and Hospital, Nagpur, on 3 May 1987.

With a military career spanning 39 years, Lt General Pande served in prestigious command and staff assignments in conventional and counterinsurgency operations across a range of terrain.