Lieutenant General Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a three-star military rank (NATO code OF-8) used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on the ...

Raj Shukla,

PVSM Param Vishisht Seva Medal (PVSM) (IAST: ) is a military award of India. It was constituted in 1960 and since then it is awarded in recognition to peace-time service of the most exceptional order and may be awarded posthumously. All ranks of the ...

, YSM, SM, ADC is a retired General Officer of the

Indian Army The Indian Army is the land-based branch and the largest component of the Indian Armed Forces. The President of India is the Supreme Commander of the Indian Army, and its professional head is the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), who is a four ...

who served as the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the Army Training Command (GOC-in-C ARTRAC). He assumed office on 1 May 2020, succeeding Lt Gen P C Thimayya. He superannuated on 31 March 2022. He is currently, a member of the

Union Public Service Commission The Union Public Service Commission ( ISO: ), commonly abbreviated as UPSC, is India's premier central recruitment agency for recruitment of all the Group 'A' officers under Government of India. It is responsible for appointments to and exam ...

Early life and education

Shukla is an alumnus of Uttar Pradesh

Sainik School The Sainik Schools are a system of schools in India established and managed by the Sainik Schools Society under Ministry of Defence (MoD). They were conceived in 1961 by V. K. Krishna Menon, the then Defence Minister of India, to rectify the re ...

Lucknow , National Defence Academy Khadakwasla Pune and

Indian Military Academy The Indian Military Academy (IMA) is one of the oldest military academies in India, and trains officers for the Indian Army. Located in Dehradun, Uttarakhand, it was established in 1932 following a recommendation by a military committee set u ...

. Shukla was commissioned into the

Regiment of Artillery The Regiment of Artillery is a combat/fighting arm of the Indian Army, which provides massive firepower during all ground operations of the Indian Army. It is a successor to the Royal Indian Artillery (RIA) of British Indian Army, which its ...

in December 1982. He has also attended the

Defence Services Staff College The Defence Services Staff College (DSSC) is a defence service training institution of the Ministry of Defence, Government of India. It trains officers of all three services of the Indian Armed Forces – ( Indian Military Service, Indian Nav ...

, the Higher Defence Management Course at the College of Defence Management and the National Defence College.

Career

Shukla has commanded a Medium Regiment in the Eastern theatre as part of a Mountain Division. He later took the regiment to the Desert as part of a Strike Corps. He has also commanded an Infantry brigade in

Counter-insurgency Counterinsurgency (COIN) is "the totality of actions aimed at defeating irregular forces". The Oxford English Dictionary defines counterinsurgency as any "military or political action taken against the activities of guerrillas or revolutionar ...

operations and an infantry division in the

Kashmir Valley The Kashmir Valley, also known as the ''Vale of Kashmir'', is an intermontane valley concentrated in the Kashmir Division of the Indian- union territory of Jammu and Kashmir. The valley is bounded on the southwest by the Pir Panjal Range a ...

, along the Line of Control. He is a qualified aviator and has flown along the borders in

Sikkim Sikkim (; ) is a state in Northeastern India. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region of China in the north and northeast, Bhutan in the east, Province No. 1 of Nepal in the west and West Bengal in the south. Sikkim is also close to the Siligu ...

and in the North–East. In his staff appointments, Shukla has served as the General Staff Officer, Grade I (GSO-I) of an infantry division as well as two tenures in the Military Operations directorate at Army Headquarters. He has also served in instructional appointments in the School of Artillery and the

Indian Military Training Team The Indian Military Training Team (IMTRAT), established since 1961–62, is a training mission of the Indian Army in Bhutan. IMTRAT is responsible for the training of the personnel of the Royal Bhutan Army (RBA) and the Royal Bodyguard of Bhutan ( ...

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountai ...

. On 5 July 2018, Shukla took command of the X Corps at Bhatinda from Lt Gen P C Thimayya. After an year's stint at the helm of X Corps, he relinquished command on 30 July 2019, handing over to Lt Gen Ajai Singh. He subsequently took over as the Director General Perspective Planning (DGPP) at Integrated Headquarters of the

Ministry of Defence {{unsourced, date=February 2021 A ministry of defence or defense (see spelling differences), also known as a department of defence or defense, is an often-used name for the part of a government responsible for matters of defence, found in state ...

. On 1 May 2020, Shukla took over as the General Officer Commanding-in Chief Army Training Command from Lt Gen P C Thimayya. Shukla has been a Research Fellow at the Institute for Defense Studies and Analyses and a visiting fellow at the Centre for Land Warfare Studies.

Military awards and decorations

He is a recipient of the

Param Vishisht Seva Medal Param Vishisht Seva Medal (PVSM) ( IAST: ) is a military award of India. It was constituted in 1960 and since then it is awarded in recognition to peace-time service of the most exceptional order and may be awarded posthumously. All ranks of the ...

, Yudh Seva Medal and the

Sena Medal The Sena Medal is awarded to members of the Indian army, of all ranks, "for such individual acts of exceptional devotion to duty or courage as have special significance for the Army." Awards may be made posthumously and a bar is authorized for s ...

Dates of rank

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shukla, Raj Indian generals Living people Recipients of the Sena Medal Recipients of the Yudh Seva Medal Indian Army officers National Defence Academy (India) alumni Year of birth missing (living people) Recipients of the Param Vishisht Seva Medal College of Defence Management alumni