It has also been involved in internal security, including Operation Blue Star and also serving as the "Personal Force" of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to suppress opposition parties during the state of emergency from 1975 to 1977.

During the time of the Great Game, the British Indian Army began to employ Tibetans as spies, intelligence agents, and even covert militia in North India and Tibet proper.

[citation needed] At the time of Indian independence, the northern mountain-covered region of India remained the most isolated and strategically overlooked territory of the subcontinent.

Former CIA officer John Kennet Knaus who worked in Tibet credited IB Chief Bhola Nath Mullik for SFF formation.

[1] The primary task of SFF is defence against the People's Liberation Army (PLA) Ground Force as well as conducting clandestine intelligence gathering and commando operations along the Chinese border.

[11] Initially known as Establishment 22 within the military and intelligence community due to its first Inspector General, Maj. Gen. Sujan Singh Uban, who commanded the 22nd Mountain Regiment of the Royal Indian Artillery during World War II.

[15] In 1968 with the help of Aviation Research Centre (ARC), SFF were provided with airlift facilities and became fully airborne-qualified with a dedicated mountain and jungle warfare unit.

[16] The US government pulled out the CIA from the training program as relations with India soured in the early 1970s during the period of Cold War, with the Sino-Soviet split and Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to China for improving the bilateral relationship.

[17] The unit conducted limited cross-border reconnaissance missions as well as highly classified joint operations with the CIA in 1965 on Mount Nanda Devi in the Himalayas.

In the past, each battalion, consisting of six companies, was commanded by a Tibetan who had a rank equivalent to a lieutenant colonel in the Indian Army.

[16][22] The Special Frontier Force retains a military rank insignia system distinct from other Indian paramilitary organizations.

[16] Deputy leader Tenzin Norbu was posthumously honored by 119 Infantry Battalion of Territorial Army from Assam Regiment and awarded a memento from the Government of India, signed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his service at Siachen glacier.

Around 3,000 members from SFF Task Force was deployed to conduct pre-emptive strike to support the Indian Army formations along the Chittagong Hill Tracts and to train the local underground unit called Mujib Bahini.

With war imminent, SFF successfully executed several mission plans that included the destruction of the Kaptai Dam and other bridges of strategic value.

The Tibetans were given mortars and recoilless rifles and two Mil Mi-4 helicopters of the Indian Air Force, and captured several villages in the Chittagong Hill Tracts.

On the night of 14 November 1971 in the forests of Chittagong Hill Tracts, Brigadier Dhondup Gyatotsang during Operation Mountain Eagle was killed in a firefight with Special Service Group of the Pakistan Army.

[29][30] SFF participated in Kargil War for which the unit had received letter of commendation from Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Later in November 1964, the CIA launched a U2 flight out of Aviation Research Centre (ARC)'s Charbatia Air Base in Orissa, but its return turned out to be something of a mishap.

The operation, in the garb of a mountaineering expedition to Nanda Devi, involved celebrated Indian climber M S Kohli who, along with operatives of SFF and CIA (most notably Jim Rhyne, a veteran STOL pilot), was to emplace a permanent ELINT device, a transceiver powered by a plutonium battery, that could detect and report data on future nuclear tests carried out by China.

Barry Bishop, a photographer with the magazine, interested General Curtis LeMay of the United States Air Force in the idea.

[38][39] SFF which formed the core team, was reported to have conducted joint operation with Indian Army around Gurung Hill, Rezang La including the capture of heights in South Pangong Tso range.

[42] During this operation, on 1 September 2020, company leader Nyima Tenzin died in a landmine blast while undertaking a reconnaissance mission along the line of actual control.