NEW DELHI (PTI): After serving at strategic XV Corps of Army last year, Lt Gen KJS Dhillon will take over the post of Director General Defence Intelligence Agency and Deputy Chief of Integrated Defence Staff (Intelligence), officials said on Monday.

It is a department that comes under the Chief of Defence Staff in the newly created Department of Military Affairs.

The 57-year-old Lt Gen Dhillon, who is from the 1983 batch of the Indian Military Academy, recently handed over the charge of XV Corps to Lt Gen B S Raju.

Officials in the Defence Ministry said that the order for Lt Gen Dhillon, who has been credited with several successful people friendly operations in the crucial last year, has been issued and he will assume the charge soon.

He will take charge as DG DIA and DCIDS, an organisation which is responsible for collating technical as well as human intelligence for the three armed forces, they said.

The DIA was created in 2002 on recommendations of a Group of Ministers which looked into lapses leading to the Kargil intrusion in 1999.

The DIA is a nodal agency for all defence related intelligence which collects information technically as well as through satellites to safeguard the interest of the country.

The DIA also forms part of the Multi Agency Centre (MAC), an umbrella of organisations which looks into infiltration of terrorists from Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK).

Lt Gen Dhillon's tenure at XV corps began on a challenging note as within a week of his taking over in February last year, the nation witnessed a terror attack on its security forces in which 40 CRPF personnel were killed when a suicide bomber targeted their convoy in Pulwama on February 14.

Coming to grips with his new role, Lt Gen Dhillon of the Rajputana Rifles, began coordinating operations against the perpetrators of the ghastly attack who were neutralised within 100 hours of the incident and also monitored developments along the Line of Control (LoC) where situation was getting more tense by the day.

He was lauded for ensuring maintenance of peace in the valley after the Centre withdrew special status of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir besides its bifurcation into two union territories.

There was no loss of life or damage to property in the aftermath of the Centre's decision.

He was also appreciated for three major people-friendly operations during his tenure at Kashmir-based strategically-located XV Corps which including 'Operation Maa' (mother), 'Taleem se Taraqqi' (Education leads to success) and 'Humsaya hain hum' (co-habitatants).

Lt Gen Dhillon repeatedly made appeals to women to ask their sons to shun the path of violence and rejoin the mainstream besides impressing on youth that education is the only path to success in life.

By the end of the tenure, there were as many as 50 cases where local youths after joining the militant fold returned on appeals by their mothers and sisters as Lt Gen Dhillon believed that women play an important role in every household of Kashmir.