Directorate General Defence Estates

The Directorate General, Defence Estates (abbreviate as: DGDE) is the main regulatory and advisory body that provides inputs on matters of Cantonments and defence land matters to the Ministry of Defence  and service headquarters i.e, Indian Army, Indian Navy, Indian Air Force and other organizations under Ministry of Defence of Government of India. DGDE is the headquarters of the Indian Defence Estates Service.

Functions of DGDE
The main responsibilities of DGDE are: Acquisition of lands, Resettlement and Rehabilitation of displaced persons, Hiring and requisitioning of lands and buildings.

Acts
It also ensures implementation policies, rules, regulations and executive instructions:


 * The Cantonments Act, 2006
 * The Cantonments (Execution of Warrants for the Attachment and sale of Immovable Property) Rules, 2016
 * Transfer of Property of Cantonments (Form of Notice and Manner of giving such notice) Rules, 2016
 * The Cantonment (Forms and Manner of Service of Notice) Rules, 2016

Civil Service
The personnel of Indian Defence Estates Service (IDES) (an organised Group 'A' Central Civil Service, requirement by UPSC) are main officers who manage the DGDE and Cantonments in whole India, they works under Ministry of Defence.

DGDE has under its jurisdiction six Principal Directorates namely- Principal Directors, Central, Eastern, Northern, Southern, South-western and Western Command. Under the Principal Directorates there are 39 Defence Estates Offices and 4 ADEO Circles for management of Defence lands in the country.

Management of Cantonments
There are total 61 Cantonment Boards or simply Cantonments in India under DGDE. These are local bodies responsible for providing civic administration and implementing the Central Govt schemes of social welfare, public health, hygiene, safety, water supply, sanitation, urban renewal and education.

These Cantonments are managed by an IDES officers. The head IDES officer of an Cantonment posted as CEO. The term of office of a member of a board is five years. A cantonment board consists of eight elected members, three nominated military members, three ex-officio members (station commander, garrison engineer and senior executive medical officer), and one representative of the district magistrate.

There are 62 Cantonment Boards in India, managed by Directorate General Defence Estates (DGDE).


 * Cantonments are divided into four categories-
 * 1) Category I – population exceeds fifty thousand
 * 2) Category II – population exceeds ten thousand, but does not exceed fifty thousand
 * 3) Category III – population exceeds two thousand five hundred, but does not exceed ten thousand
 * 4) Category IV – population does not exceed two thousand five hundred.

Functions of cantonment
The cantonment takes care of mandatory duties such as provision of public health, water supply, sanitation, primary education, and street lighting etc. As the resources are owned by Government of India, (1) For every cantonment there shall be a Cantonment Board. (2) Every Board shall be deemed to be a municipality under clause (e) of article 243P of the Constitution for the purposes of- (a) receiving grants and allocations; or (b) implementing the Central Government schemes of social welfare, public health, hygiene, safety, water supply, sanitation, urban renewal and education. It is the duty of the president of the cantonment board:
 * unless prevented by reasonable cause, to convene and preside at all meetings of the board and to regulate the conduct of business;
 * to control, direct and supervise the financial and executive administration of the board;
 * to perform all the duties and exercise all the powers specially imposed or conferred on the president by or under this act; and
 * subject to any restrictions, limitations and conditions imposed by this Act, to exercise executive power for the purpose of carrying out the provisions of this Act.
 * in case of gross misconduct during the course of meeting, to suspend a member other than a chief executive officer from attending the un-conduct part of the meeting of the Board.

Northern region

 * Himachal Pradesh
 * Bakloh (near Chamba)
 * Dagshai (near Solan)
 * Dalhousie Cantonment (Near Chamba)
 * Jutogh (near Shimla)
 * Kasauli (Solan)
 * Sabathu (near Solan)


 * Jammu and Kashmir
 * Badami Bagh (near Srinagar)
 * Jammu

North-western region

 * Delhi
 * Delhi


 * Haryana
 * Ambala


 * Punjab
 * Amritsar
 * Firozpur
 * Jalandhar

North-Central region

 * Uttarakhand;
 * Almora
 * Chakrata
 * Clement Town (near Dehradun)
 * Dehradun
 * Landour (near Mussoorie)
 * Lansdowne
 * Nainital
 * Ranikhet
 * Roorkee

Central region

 * Madhya Pradesh;
 * Jabalpur
 * Mhow
 * Morar
 * Pachmarhi
 * Sagar


 * Uttar Pradesh
 * Agra
 * Ayodhya
 * Babina (near Jhansi)
 * Bareilly
 * Jhansi
 * Kanpur
 * Lucknow
 * Fatehgarh
 * Mathura
 * Meerut
 * Prayagraj
 * Shahjahanpur
 * Varanasi

Western region

 * Rajasthan
 * Ajmer
 * Nasirabad (near Ajmer)


 * Gujarat
 * Ahmedabad


 * Maharashtra
 * Ahmednagar
 * Aurangabad
 * Dehu Road (in Pune)
 * Deolali (near Nashik)
 * Kamptee (near Nagpur)
 * Khadki (in Pune)
 * Camp (in Pune)

Eastern region

 * Bihar
 * Danapur


 * Jharkhand
 * Ramgarh


 * Meghalaya
 * Shillong


 * West Bengal
 * Barrackpur
 * Jalapahar (in Darjeeling)
 * Lebong (in Darjeeling)

Southern region

 * Karnataka
 * Belgaum


 * Kerala
 * Kannur


 * Tamil Nadu
 * St.Thomas Mount-cum-Pallavaram (in Chennai)
 * Wellington


 * Telangana
 * Secunderabad