Conflict zone expert, old Valley hand is Govt’s choice for new J&K DGP

Prabhat was serving as Director General of the National Security Guard (NSG), India’s elite counter-terror force, until Wednesday when the government issued orders curtailing the tenure and moved him from the Andhra Pradesh cadre to the AGMUT cadre with immediate effect.

Prabhat’s posting comes ahead of expected Assembly elections in J&K and at a time when there is a spurt in terror incidents in the Union territory, especially in the Jammu region.

A graduate from Delhi University’s St Stephens College, Prabhat has spent most of his career in conflict zones, largely serving in the Naxal-affected areas of Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra, apart from long stints in Kashmir and Ladakh.

In the very beginning of his career, Prabhat served as an ASP in Andhra Pradesh’s elite counter-Naxal commando force Greyhounds. As per sources, Prabhat volunteered to join the force, and served as an “assault commander” in it. He went on to head the force in 2018-19.

At the peak of Naxal violence in Andhra Pradesh, Prabhat served as the Superintendent of Police in Karimnagar and Warangal between 1998 and 2004. Both Karimnagar and Warangal were then among the worst Naxal-affected districts.

Sources said it was Prabhat who led the police team during the Koyyur encounter in Karimnagar that led to the killing of three top central committee members of the then CPI (ML) People’s War Group. It was after this encounter that in, December 2000, it formed the People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army.

After his stint in Andhra Pradesh, Prabhat was moved to Central deputation, and served in Srinagar and Ladakh with the ITBP as a commandant. In 2007, Prabhat joined the CRPF as DIG (South Kashmir), and supervised anti-terror operations in the region for three years.

He then did brief stints with the CRPF in Chandigarh and in Bastar, Chhattisgarh, before returning to Srinagar again, where he served with the force for another three years.

From Srinagar, Prabhat was plunged into another conflict zone as IG (anti-Naxal operations) in Maharashtra, and served in Gadchiroli.

In April 2013, he was brought back to Srinagar to head the CRPF’s operations in the region. He went on to become the ADG at CRPF headquarters in Delhi before being sent to Kashmir again in early 2023.

In May this year, he was appointed the DG of the NSG.

Those who have worked with Prabhat call him a “hands-on officer” who likes the field more than being in office. He is also seen as having a deep understanding of counter-insurgency and guerrilla warfare.

His gallantry medals have all come from his deputation in different conflict zones – one when he was posted in Andhra, one when in South Kashmir and one in Srinagar.

Apart from this, he has won awards and commendations such as the Parakram Padak, two Antarik Suraksha Padaks, Police Medal, and Bar and Police Medal for Meritorious Service.

One of the biggest security challenges of his career was the 2010 Chintalnar massacre, in which over 70 CRPF soldiers were killed in a Maoist ambush in Bastar. Prabhat was then the DIG (Bastar) with the CRPF.

Prabhat will replace Swain, a 1991-batch IPS officer originally belonging to Odisha, who has also had long stints in J&K in a series of sensitive posts over the years. Swain, who will retire on September 30, has been in J&K in his latest stint since 2020, a year after the abrogation of Article 370, when he was deputed as the ADG of the J&K Police’s Criminal Investigation Department.

In the wake of the scrapping of J&K’s special status and its division into two Union territories, bringing it under direct Central control, the position Swain held as the intelligence chief came to be among the most powerful in the Valley.

In an interview to The Indian Express earlier this month, soon after he was named J&K DGP, Swain said the State was “mandated to enforce law and order” and that “the approach of the security establishment has been appreciated by large sections of society”. “Anywhere in the world, you would want (the) surety that you would come back safe if you are going out.”

Swain also denied claims that in efforts to neutralise the “terror ecosystem”, innocents had been targeted through denial of passports, arbitrary arrests on flimsy charges or ouster from service, saying their numbers were minuscule.