The Kargil Review Committee (KRC) is a landmark institutional concept in India's national security framework, established by the Government of India on July 29, 1999, just three days after the end of the Kargil War. Chaired by strategic affairs expert K. Subrahmanyam, its primary purpose was to review the events leading up to the Pakistani aggression in the Kargil district and recommend measures to safeguard national security against future armed intrusions. The committee was created to solve the problem of systemic failures, particularly the intelligence failure, that led to the nation being caught by surprise by the intrusion.
The KRC submitted its report to Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee on January 7, 2000, and it was tabled in Parliament on February 23, 2000. The report, which included 21 recommendations in its final Chapter 14, found that the intrusion was a "complete and total surprise" and highlighted flaws in intelligence collection, inter-agency coordination, and outdated military assumptions. A key provision was the recommendation for a comprehensive review of the national security system.
The KRC connects directly to the subsequent formation of the Group of Ministers (GoM) in 2000, which was tasked with implementing the KRC's recommendations. The most significant and recently implemented recommendation was the creation of the post of the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) to ensure jointness among the armed forces, which was finally implemented in December 2019. Other key outcomes included the establishment of the Defence Intelligence Agency and the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) in 2004, and the institutionalization of a full-time National Security Advisor. The KRC's recommendations were later reviewed by the Naresh Chandra Task Force in 2011 to assess implementation and suggest further changes.