General Joginder Jaswant Singh, PVSM, AVSM, VSM, ADC (born 17 September 1945) is an Indian politician and former Army Chief. He was the 21st Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) of the Indian Army. He was appointed on 27 November 2004, and took over the role when his predecessor, General N C Vij, retired on 31 January 2005. He was succeeded by General Deepak Kapoor. He served as the COAS from 31 January 2005, to 30 September 2007.
He is the first Sikh to have led the Indian Army and the 11th chief of army staff from the Western Command based at Chandimandir. His selection was not a surprise, as at the time of his appointment he was the most senior officer in the army after General N C Vij. Following his retirement, he became Governor of the state of Arunachal Pradesh on 27 January 2008.
Early life and education
Joginder Jaswant Singh was born in a military family in Samma Satta. He is a Sikh Khatri of Sareen sub-caste with origins from Rawalpindi. He is the first child of Lieutenant Colonel Jaswant Singh Marwah (b. 1921) and his wife Jaspal Kaur (1923–2006). Sama Satta was then a town in the princely state of Bahawalpur State, now part of Pakistan. His family originated from the town of Daultala, now also in Pakistan, Rawalpindi District. He is a third-generation soldier; his paternal grandfather Sepoy (Private) Atma Singh Marwah (1896-1968) enlisted in the 1/67 Punjab Regiment of the British Indian Army as a drummer in 1914, and fought at the Siege of Kut in the Mesopotamian Campaign during the First World War. Wounded in his right elbow and arm early on, he was evacuated and sent to recuperate in the south of France, after which he was discharged from the army in 1918. Joginder's father, Jaswant, is a veteran of the Second World War who passed out from the Indian Military Academy in April 1943 and was commissioned into the Royal Indian Army Service Corps. In 1943, he was posted to the Reserve Supply Depot at Karachi, and married his wife Jaspal Kaur in December 1944. In February 1945, he was posted to Sama Satta and given command of a petroleum sub-depot; Joginder was born that September. After independence and Partition in August 1947, the family migrated to Patiala in India. In 1948, Jaswant transferred to the Indian Army Corps of Electrical and Mechanical Engineers as a Captain.
Growing up, Joginder and his family lived in different army cantonments across north India, as his father was frequently transferred. As an army brat, Joginder naturally took to army life and culture. He received his early education in Catholic convent schools, St. Anne's in Secunderabad and St Mary's Presentation Convent in Jammu, where his father was stationed from 1956 to 1960 as a major commanding the Recovery Company. In 1958, he transferred to Model Academy in Jammu and matriculated in 1960. While Jaswant was posted to Udhampur in 1959, the family remained in Jammu.
Military career
Early career
In January 1961, Joginder joined the 25th course of the National Defence Academy, and was still a cadet when the Sino-Indian War broke out in 1962. The deputy commandant of the NDA at the time, Brigadier Hoshiar Singh, was given command of a brigade under the 4th Infantry Division and was killed in action. Largely unprepared for war and humiliated by its defeats, the Indian armed forces underwent a large-scale expansion after hostilities ended, with emergency commissions given to several thousand candidates from 1963 to 1965. The one-year training at the NDA was shortened to seven months, as a result of which Joginder and his class were commissioned early as second lieutenants on 2 August 1964, with Joginder receiving his officer's pips from his father at the passing-out ceremony. His grandfather Atma Singh also gave him his blessing, saying, "God willing, the son of a private shall be a Karnail, and the son of the Karnail shall be a Jarnail!"
Gen. Singh is an alumnus of the National Defence Academy and was commissioned into the 9 Maratha Light Infantry on 2 August 1964. He received the colour of the battalion from the late president Dr. Zakir Husain at the Investiture Parade in 1968.