Colonel Saurabh Singh Shekhawat, KC, SC, SM, VSM, joined IDSA as Research Fellow in July 2016. He is a serving Army Officer with vast experience of counter terrorist and counter insurgency operations in the North and North East. He has also served as United Nations Military Observer in the Democratic Republic of Congo where he worked for Demobilisation, Disarmament, Repatriation, Rehabilitation and Resettlement of the cadres and rebels of various warring factions. An alumnus of the Defence Services Staff College, the officer has an MPhil degree from Osmania University, Hyderabad and published a dissertation on “Rise of Fundamentalism in Af- Pak Region, Threat to India and Role of Central Asian Republics in its Containment”.The officer is also an avid mountaineer having climbed a total of 17 peaks in Asia, Europe and Africa including Everest which he has summited “three times”. His research at IDSA focuses on ‘Rise of ISIS: Significance and Implications for India’.