The central government has appointed Dilip Rath as Chairman of the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) for two years.

A 1979 IAS batch officer, Rath has assumed charge from Dec 1 as per the notification issued by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), Govt of India.

He was holding additional charge of the post of chairman since August 1, 2016.

Rath took premature retirement from the service (IAS) to join NDDB as Managing Director in 2011.

Ever since joining NDDB, he has been instrumental in building a strong connect with the dairy cooperatives.

He was always in favour of creating farmer-owned institutions for providing rural milk producers with greater access to the organised milk-processing sector.

As Mission Director of the National Dairy Plan (NDP), he is actively pursuing the project objectives of increasing productivity of milch animals and thereby increase milk production to meet the rapidly growing demand for milk.

During his tenure in NDDB, Rath has been a strong advocate of a transparent payment system where milk payments are disbursed directly to the producers’ accounts in banks. 

Rath has wide experience in dairy development and cooperatives.

Prior to this, he was Joint Secretary in the Department of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries, Government of India from 2008 to 2010 and Director on the board of NDDB.

Apart from this, he served in different capacities under the State Governments of West Bengal, Odisha and the Central Government.

He received Master’s degree in Economics from the Jawaharlal Nehru University and MSc in Economics from the London School of Economics.