Ajit Kumar Doval (born 20 January 1945) is an Indianbureaucrat,spymaster and retired police and intelligence officer who has been serving as the longest tenuredNational Security Advisor of India (NSA) since 2014. Doval is serving his third consecutive five-year term as NSA. During his second tenure he was given Cabinet rank. Doval previously held the position ofDirector of theIntelligence Bureau from 2004 to 2005, after leading its operations wing for over a decade. He worked as a career intelligence officer for over 33 years. He is recognized for his contributions to counter-terrorism and covert missions.
He retired aschief of the Intelligence Bureau in January 2005. In retirement he gave lectures, interviews and wroteop-eds. Around 2008, he helped set up theRashtriya Raksha University. In 2009, he bacame founder director of theVivekananda International Foundation, a public policy think tank based in New Delhi, and served as its director until his appointment as NSA. Major military operations during Doval's tenure includeOperation Hot Pursuit, theBalakot airstrike andOperation Sindoor. TheDoklam standoff was eventually resolved through diplomatic channels and negotiations.
Doval was born in 1945 in Ghiri Banelsyun village inPauri Garhwal inUnited Provinces (now inUttarakhand) in the erstwhile British Raj (currentlyIndia).[1][2] he is the son of GN Doval and Indra Doval.[3] Doval's father,Major Gunanand Doval, was an officer in the Indian Army.[4][5] He served in theBengal Sappers for 36 years.[4]
He married Aruni Doval in 1972 and has two childrenShaurya and Vivek Doval.[8]
During a lecture in 2015, Doval said that he comes from a vegetarian family however his work led him to eat non-vegetarian food as well.[13] During a dialogue in January 2026 Doval was asked a question about how he uses communication tools, he elaborated that he largely does not use the internet for work, and the phone only for family and when speaking to people abroad. He stated that there were also other methods of communication not used by the general public.[14][15]
He does not have a social media account.[16] He is fluent in Urdu.[17]
Doval joined theIndian Police Service (IPS) in 1968 in theKerala cadre as the Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) ofKottayam district in Kerala.[18][19] In 1972, he was transferred to riot hitThalassery, Kerala.[20] He was there for a few months between January and June 1972.[20] In the same year he went on to join the central service, theIntelligence Bureau (IB).[6] His government job in the IB largely saw him as a "typical undercover agent".[21]
One of Doval's first assignments in the IB was to tackle the insurgency innortheast India, specifically inMizoram.[6] Between 1972 and 1977 he officially led the IBs Subsidiary Intelligence Bureau inAizawl.[6] Doval spent these five years mostly undercover.[21] During this period he was awarded thePolice Medal for meritorious service in 1974.[22] Doval had a role in laying the groundwork for negotiation, the 1976 agreement,[6] and eventually theMizoram Peace Accord of 1986.[11][21][23] He was the man behind turning six of seven ofLaldenga's commanders.[21]
He had a role inSikkim's merger with India in 1975 encompassing political engineering, liaisoning and facilitation.[11][24] He was head of the IBs Subsidiary Intelligence Bureau in Sikkim.[6]
Doval was in Pakistan for seven years.[6][25] He worked at theIndian High Commission in Islamabad from 1983 to 1987.[26] Officially he was head of the commercial section.[27] His undercover roles in Pakistan would allow him to visit mosques for prayers and make friends through which he could gather relevant information.[28] To fit the role, he had to get plastic surgery done on his pierced ears.[28][29] Working undercover in Pakistan as a beggar, he collected hair from scientists from a barber shop; this hair tested positive for signs of uranium, helping to expose Pakistan's nuclear programme.[30][31] He also kept a watch over Sikh pilgrims and the separatist propaganda they faced.[27]
He has the experience of being involved in the termination of all 15 hijackings ofIndian Airlines aircraft from 1971 to 1999,[40][28][39][page needed] a notable instance was the 1999hijacked aeroplane IC-814.[41][22][42] Doval would go on to say the negotiation was a diplomatic failure.[43] This was the first time Doval would come under the gaze of the media.[6][22]
He was trained underM. K. Narayanan, the third National Security Advisor of India for a brief period in counterterrorism operations.[44][27][39]
In the headquarters, he headed IB's operations wing for over a decade and was founder Chairman of theMulti Agency Centre (MAC), as well as of the Joint Task Force on Intelligence (JTFI).[33][36][39][1] He was appointedDirector of IB in July 2004 and held the post until his retirement in January 2005.[22][45][46] Doval's career as an intelligence officer spanned over 33 years.[47] In 2004 Doval was made president of theInternational Association of Chiefs of Police for Asia and Pacific region.[9][48]
In July 2005, Doval was briefly detained by Mumbai Police alongside Vicky Malhotra and Farid Tanasha, two members ofChhota Rajan's gang. Doval had been working on a secret plan to killDawood Ibrahim in Dubai where he was attending his daughter's wedding. Mumbai Police were unaware of Doval's involvement of the plot as they had gone in to arrest the two gangsters.[49][50]
Doval remained actively involved in the discourse on national security in India. Besides writing editorial pieces for several leading newspapers and journals, he delivered lectures on India's security challenges and foreign policy objectives at several renowned government and non-governmental institutions, security think-tanks in India and abroad.[6][51][52][53][citation needed]
Around 2008, Narendra Modi, then Chief Minister of Gujarat, brought in Doval to set up a university, theRashtriya Raksha University.[6][54]
In 2009 and 2012 he co-wrote two reports on "Indian Black Money Abroad in Secret Banks and Tax Havens" as a part of a task force constituted byBharatiya Janata Party.[58][59]
In 2012, IB kept eyes on him due to then ruling party Congress's suspicions that Doval and VIF were the brains behindRamdev andAnna Hazare led anti-corruption movement, which generated anger against the government.[60]
On 30 May 2014, Doval was appointed as India's fifthNational Security Advisor (NSA).[65] Doval will hold the post as long as Narendra Modi is the Prime Minister, or until further orders.[51]
He was appointed as the Prime Minister's special envoy to Afghanistan.[17]
In June 2014, Doval facilitated the return of 46 Indian nurses who were trapped in a hospital inTikrit, Iraq, following thecapture of Mosul byISIL. Doval, flew to Iraq on 25 June 2014 to understand the position on the ground and make high-level contacts in theIraqi government.[66] Although the exact circumstances of their release are unclear, on 5 July 2014, ISIL militants handed the nurses toKurdish authorities atErbil city and anAir India plane specially-arranged by the Indian government brought them back home toKochi.[67]
Speaking at aMunich Security Conference meeting in Delhi in October 2014, he stated that India has shifted its nuclear stance "from credible minimum deterrence to credible deterrence".[68][69]
At the 21st Lalit Doshi Memorial Lecture in August 2015, during the interactive session, Doval responded to a question saying "India has a mind-set where it punches below its weight. We have to punch not above our weight, we have to punch not below our weight, we have to increase our weight and punch proportionately".[76]
In October 2018, he was appointed as the Chairman of the Strategic Policy Group (SPG), which is the first tier of a three-tier structure at theNational Security Council and forms the nucleus of its decision-making apparatus.[87][88]
On 3 June 2019, he was reappointed as NSA for another 5 years and granted the personal rank of aCabinet Minister.[92] Doval is the first NSA to hold such a rank.[27] He was previously a Minister of State.[92] Doval is widely considered to be one of Modi's most powerful and trusted advisors, with major influence over India's national security and foreign affairs.[93] He would go onto become India's longest serving NSA.[94]
NSA Doval, along with Army, Navy, and Air Force Chief meeting PMModi
On 26 February 2020, Ajit Doval walked the streets ofriot-hit northeast Delhi to assess the situation and reassure the local residents.[96]
On 15 May 2020, themilitary forces of Myanmar handed over a group of 22 militant leaders, active inAssam and othernortheast states, to the Indian government. This was made possible through negotiations headed by Doval.[97][98]
On 15 September 2020, Doval walked out of a virtualSCO meeting after Pakistan projected a fictitious map omitting parts of India.[99]
On 13 June 2024, Ajit Doval was granted third five-year extension for his tenure as National Security Advisor of India.[100]
In the2025 India–Pakistan conflict following the Pahalgam terror attack, NSA Ajit Doval played a key role in formulating India's strategic response. He coordinated Operation Sindoor, a series of precision airstrikes on terrorist camps located in Pakistan. Indian officials described the operation as "measured and non-escalatory," aimed at neutralizing terrorist threats without provoking a broader conflict.[101][102][103][104][105]
In January 2026, Doval addressed the "Viksit Bharat Young Leaders Dialogue," where he called on the youth to "avenge our history" through proactive national reconstruction.[106] This address was noted for its departure from traditional scholarly focus on historical loot, framing national building instead as a form of civilizational resurgence.[107]
Doval, speaking at thepassing out of the 2014 batch of IPS officers, said "You are now in the phase of fourth generation war... It is a warfare with an invisible enemy... it's a warfare, in which the civil society is both the battleground and... the people that you have to protect."[114] He states this is not a war of armies but a war of policemen.[114] In the passing out parade of the 2021 batch of IPS probationers he reiterated the dangers thatcivil society present over the problems ofconventional war.[115] On the contrary,Aruna Roy writes, is that Doval's conceptualisation of fourth-generation warfare has "dangerous implications" and that Doval does not define what he means by "civil society".[116] According to Roy, Doval was ignoring his obligations to the spirit of the constitution and to his office in his speech to the probationers.[117]
According to Doval, the greatest threat to a nations' security is not external aggression but internal security.[114] Doval has stated "India's internal vulnerabilities are much higher than its external vulnerabilities".[64] His writings regularly tilt towards the importance of national issues as compared to external ones.[64] In 2006 and 2011 respectively, Doval called infiltration of Bangladeshis andleft wing extremism as the biggest internal security problems.[64][118][119] In 2025 Doval stated that "left-wing extremism has reduced to less than 11 per cent areas than what existed in 2014".[120]
During the tenthNani Palkhivala Memorial lecture in February 2014, when talking about how to tackle Pakistan, he stated three postures- defensive, defensive-offence, and offensive. Doval said that India had so far been defensive and that it was time to turn to a defensive-offensive stance.[21][121] He rules out an offensive strategy as that could lead to the nuclear threshold being crossed.[21][121][122] During the lecture he stated that if another attack likeMumbai 26/11 happened, Pakistan may be split.[123][121] This three level engagement has come to be known as the 'Doval Doctrine'.[124]
At the Sardar Patel memorial lecture on governance on 1 November 2025 Doval stated that "terrorism in this country has been effectively countered"; he went on to explain that Jammu and Kashmir is a theatre for a proxy war or covert warfare.[125] Doval stated in 2019 that the media is an important component in the terrorism ecosystem.[126]
Doval was the youngest police officer to receive thePolice Medal for meritorious service.[22] He was given the award byIndira Gandhi in 1974 after six years in the police force.[6][22][133]
In 1989, Doval was granted one of the highest gallantry awards, theKirti Chakra, becoming the first police officer to receive a medal previously given only as a military honour.[135] He received the award for his role inOperation Black Thunder II.[33][23] His official citation reads,[3]
"Shri Ajit Kumar Doval was given several sensitive assignments directed against certain hard core terrorists. These assignments required a high degree of courage and dedication. It also put his personal security in peril. Regardless of the risk to his personal safety, Shri Doval prepared and executed plans against terrorists with a high degree of success bringing glory to his organization. During these assignments, there were long periods during which his whereabouts were not known which even caused concern that he has been caught and possibly tortured.
In one such assignment, he was required to deal with a group of terrorists, some of whom were considered notorious and dangerous. Dealing with them posed a grave danger to his own life. Ignoring the risk involved to his personal security, Shri Doval prepared and executed a plan for enticing the terrorists and succeeded in trapping some of the wanted notorious terrorists. In carrying out these assignments, Shri Ajit Kumar Doval has not only exhibited remarkable resourcefulness and devotion to duty, but he has carried out his task with a single-mindedness of purpose and shown exemplary courage even risking his life on several occasions."
In 2025 web seriesSalakaar forJioHotstar based on his covert operation inPakistan in 1970s, his role was played byNaveen Kasturia (as his younger self) and Purnendu Bhattacharya (as his present self) alias as Adhir Dayal.
^Sharma, Anil (2014).IA's Terror Trail. See 'Foreword' by Ajit Doval. Shehna Books. p. 7.ISBN9789351561811....this book is perhaps the first effort of its kind, which chronicles all 15 incidents of hijackings of Indian Airlines aircraft between 1971 and 1999 [...] Having had the opportunity of dealing with all these hijackings in one way or the other...
Kirti Chakra
Police Medal
President's Police Medal.jpg)
