Established in 1981, the Central Academy for State Forest Service or CASFOS has the mandate to train newly recruited State Forest Service (SFS) Officers from various States and conduct in-service trainings for serving SFS officers. The Academy is in the beautiful and sylvan campus of the world-renowned New Forest Campus in Dehradun. The vibrant capital city of Uttarakhand state, Dehradun has been the cradle of forestry education and training in India.

In the beginning, the forests in India were manned by men drawn from Civil Services and the Army. Dr. Dietrich Brandis, the first Inspector General of Forests, Government of India, after coming to India in 1864 recognized the need for fully qualified and scientifically trained officers to help him in the administration and conservation of the forests in the country. Brandis visualized, bringing into existence, full-fledged services of scientifically trained officers, at an early date and therefore made further proposals for providing trained forest officers to man the forests in the country. He recommended:

View of CASFOS Dehradun

• Provision of facilities of studying forestry in Europe for untrained forest officers of the Forest Departments in India
• Selection of probationers from Europe and planning for their training in the continent, and general scheme for permanently improving the administration of the Forest Departments of India by sending out trained men from Europe.
• In 1867, five candidates including an Indian, Framjee Rustomjee Desai, son of a Bombay merchant, were selected to undergo training in France. As it was considered necessary to train some officers in Germany also, two more candidates were sent to Hanover for training under Forest Director Burckhardit. The period of training suggested by Brandis was two and a half years. In all, 95 officers were recruited between 1867 to 1886 and trained in the continent of Europe in Germany, France, U.K. at Coopers Hill, Oxford, Cambridge, and Edinburgh.
• Although with the visit of Islington Commission to India in 1913-14, the question of training IFS probationers in India, at Dehradun where a Forest Research Institute had been established in 1906, was considered, the same was, however, turned down on technical grounds. The training of the officers for the Indian Forest Service, therefore, continued at the British Universities.
• Soon after the war, demand for probationers increased and between 1919 and 1923, 152 probationers were trained. The Government of India desired that all probationers be trained at one Centre. Finally, with the support of the Islington Commission and recommendations by the Lee Commission (1923- 24), which also recommended that the recruitment to the Indian Forest Service should be based on 25% Europeans and 75% Indians, the Governor-General finally decided to inaugurate the training of Indian Forest Service officers at the Forest Research Institute, Dehradun, from the 1st of November 1926.

Training in India at Dehra Dun (1926-1932)

The Indian Forest College (IFC) at Dehradun started in 1926 and 12 students, including 2 probationers selected by the Government of India, attended the first course held during 1926-28. The course continued until 1932, when it had to be closed due to a lack of demand for officers.

In 1966, the Indian Forest Service (IFS) was constituted. The first batch of Indian Forest Service probationers comprising of 6 trainees together with 5 foreign trainees from Malawi, Nigeria, Indonesia, and Afghanistan was trained in the Indian Forest College, Dehradun in the 1968-70 course. Later in 1987, this college was renamed as Indira Gandhi National Forest Academy (IGNFA). It is solely dedicated to the training of Indian Forest Service officers of various levels.

The Provincial Service Course

The proposal to constitute a Provincial Service was first mooted in 1891 with a view to meet the increased demand for trained officers at a comparatively lower cost. This service was to form a link between the Imperial Service and the Subordinate Executive Service. In the early years of the inauguration of service, young men mostly of European extraction came into the Service but instructions were soon issued to confine recruitment to the promotion of Rangers of proved meritorious service only.

When the FRI at Dehradun came into existence in 1906, the status of the Imperial Forest School, which had been training Rangers since 1878, was raised to that of a college, called the Imperial Forest College and, in the same year, a third-year course was introduced for training selected Rangers for admission to the Provincial Service.

The Superior Forest Service Course (1938 onwards)

The training of the gazetted officers of the Forest Department remained suspended from 1933 to 1938 when demand for training such officers arose again. Forest was by then a transferred subject under the control of the various provinces and princely states and recruitment to the Indian Forest Service had ceased. Superior Forest Service was created in the States to replace the Indian Forest Service and a course of training for these officers was started in 1938 at the Forest Research Institute, Dehradun. The first batch consisted of 16 students. The College was named the Indian Forest College and was in one of the blocks of the main building of the Institute.

The State Forest Service colleges

The Superior Forest Service course continued in the college up to the year 1975. Consequent upon the constitution of Indian Forest Service with effect from 1.10.1966, the subsequent course for the training of State Forest Service officers in the Indian Forest College was termed as State Forest Service course. Initially, the training of Indian Forest Service probationers was conducted combined with the State Forest Service officers from 1971-73 to 1973-75. However, for the Indian Forest Service probationers, additional lectures on certain subjects were included in the course. For the courses 1976-78 onwards, separate courses are being conducted for the Indian Forest Service probationers and foreign trainees in the Indian Forest College, Dehradun. With the separation of the classes of the State Forest Service and the Indian Forest Service, a separate college for the training of State Forest Service officers was started at Burnihat in Assam in May 1976.

To cope with the increase in demand of trained State Forest Service officers, a second State Forest Service college was started at Coimbatore in January 1980. Subsequently, the third State Forest Service college was opened at Dehradun in May 1981.

Central Academy for State Forest Service

On 6th August 2009 all the three State Forest Service colleges at Dehradun, Coimbatore and Burnihat were renamed as Central Academy for State Forest Service (CASFOS). At present, there are three Central Academies for State Forest Services in India. All are under the direct control of the Directorate of Forest Education (DFE), Dehradun under the Ministry of Environment Forest & Climate Change, Government of India. The Academy at Burnihat, Assam was the first to be set up in India in May 1976. The Academy at Dehradun was the third and so far, the last Academy to be set up. It was established in the New Forest campus on 01.05.198l.

Past Principals

Name of Directors	From - Date	To - Date	Photo
Shri H. C. Changkakati, IFS	01-05-1981	10-02-1982
Shri S. S. Channa, IFS	11-02-1982	08-12-1983
Shri M. C. Pande, IFS	09-12-1983	08-04-1984
Shri N. K. Joshi, IFS	09-04-1984	27-01-1985
Shri P. Keshwani, IFS	28-01-1985	29-09-1985
Shri J. P. Kandpal, IFS	30-09-1985	03-07-1988
Shri Balvinder Singh, IFS	04-07-1988	02-10-1989
Shri S. R. Mehta, IFS	03-10-1989	17-10-1933
Shri R. K. Zutshi, IFS	18-10-1993	25-16-1995
Shri S. S. Garbyal, IFS	26-06-1995	23-10-1997
Shri Jarnail Singh, IFS	24-10-1997	25-07-2000
Shri Suresh Chandra, IFS	26-07-2000	31-07-2007
Smt Savita, IFS	01-04-2007	05-08-2009
Dr. Savita, IFS	06-08-2009	16-11-2011
Shri Ashish Rawat, IFS	17-11-2011	14-04-2014
Shri N. Sonazalian, IFS	15-04-2014	30-11-2015
Ms. Meera Iyer, IFS	30-01-2016	13-07-2018
Shri. Kunal Satyarthi, IFS	05-02-2019	23-09-2021