Karnal: Agri varsity VC honoured with Dr D Sundaresan Memorial Oration award
As part of the ongoing academic fortnight celebrations leading to the 22nd convocation of ICAR-National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI), Karnal, the prestigious Dr D Sundaresan Memorial Oration was held at the Dr D Sundaresan auditorium of the institute.
Dr Dheer Singh, director of ICAR-NDRI, presided over the event and extended a warm welcome to Dr Manmohan Singh Chauhan, Vice-Chancellor of Govind Ballabh Pant University of Agriculture and Technology (GB Pant UA&T), Pantnagar, Uttarakhand, who was honoured with the Dr D Sundaresan Memorial Oration Award 2025.
Dr Singh highlighted Dr Chauhan’s eminence as an animal scientist, former director of the ICAR-Central Institute for Research on Goats, Mathura, and former director of ICAR-NDRI, Karnal. A recipient of several international fellowships, the ICAR Team Award, and fellowships from multiple scientific societies, Dr Chauhan pioneered sexed semen technology, embryo transfer, in vitro fertilization (IVF) in Indian livestock, and the cloning of the world’s first buffalo calf.
Dr Chauhan delivered a lecture titled ‘Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) in Dairy Animals: A roadmap to Viksit Bharat 2047’. He outlined how ARTs could revolutionise India’s dairy sector by doubling per-animal milk yield through scaling artificial insemination to 33 per cent coverage, deploying 58 lakh doses of sexed semen, and producing 25,895 IVF/embryo transfers — potentially elevating output to 400-500 million tonnes, adding Rs 3-5 lakh crore annually to gross domestic product via exports, generating 10-15 million jobs, and boosting rural incomes.
Biotechnology, he emphasised, is vital for sustaining India’s growing population, with ARTs enhancing milk production, reproductive efficiency and genetic progress in livestock. India’s dairy sector — the nation’s largest source of agricultural income — is pivotal to the Viksit Bharat 2047 vision of a developed and self-reliant India.
