Department of Business and Industrial

Management
2009-2010

Submitted to : Ms. Manisha Panwala

Submitted by : Desai Bhavik (7)
Doshi Rushabh(8)
MBA (FT) (A) 3rd sem. (Marketing)
Verghese Kurien
 Introduction
• Verghese Kurien (born November 26, 1921 at Kozhikode, Kerala) is called
the father of the White Revolution in India. He is also known as the Milkman of
India.
• He was the chairman of the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation
Ltd.(GCMMF). GCMMF is an apex cooperative organization that manages
the Amul food brand.
• He is recognised as the man behind the success of the Amul brand. Amul had a
revenue of $1b USD in 2006-07.
• He is credited with being the architect of Operation Flood -- the largest dairy
development program in the world.
• Kurien helped modernise Anand model of cooperative dairy development and
thus engineered the White Revolution in India, and made India the
largest milk producer in the world.
 Education and Career
• Kurien graduated in Physics from Loyola College, Madras in 1940 and then did B.E.
(Mech) from the University of Madras.
• After completing his degree, he joined the Tata Steel Technical
Institute, Jamshedpur from where he graduated in 1946.
• He then went to USA on a government scholarship to earn his Master of
Science in Mechanical Engineering (with distinction) from Michigan State
University.
• When he came back to India, he was posted as a dairy engineer at the government
creamery, Anand, in May 1949.
• Around the same time, the infant cooperative dairy, Kaira District Co-operative
Milk Producers' Union (KDCMPUL), now famous as Amul -- was fighting a battle
with the Polson Dairy, which was privately owned.
• Young Kurien, fed up with being at the government creamery, which held no
challenge, volunteered to help Shri Tribhuvandas Patel, the Chairman of
KDCMPUL, to set up a processing plant. This marked the birth of AMUL.
 The White Revolution
• The Amul pattern of cooperatives had been so successful, in 1965, then Prime Minister of
India, Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri, created the National Dairy Development Board
(NDDB) (NDDB) to replicate the program on a nationwide basis citing Kurien's "extraordinary
and dynamic leadership" upon naming him chairman.
• Kurien also set up GCMMF (Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation) in 1973 to sell
the products produced by the dairies.
• Kurien, plays a key role in many other organizations, ranging from chairing the Viksit Bharat
Foundation, a body set up by the President of India to chairman of the Institute of Rural
Management, Anand's Board of Governors in India. Dr. Kurien was mentioned by the Ashoka
foundation as one of the eminent present Day Social Entrepreneurs.
• Dr. Kurien and his team were pioneers in inventing the process of making milk powder and
condensed milk from buffalo's milk instead of cow's milk.
• This was the reason Amul became so successful and competed well against Nestle who only
used cow milk to make powder and condensed milk. In India buffalo milk was the main raw
material unlike Europe where cow milk is abundant.
• India's first Prime Minister Jawahar Lal Nehru visited Anand to inaugrate AMUL "factory" and
he embraced Dr. Kurien for his groundbreaking work.
 Awards
For his contribution to the dairy industry, Kurien has received top awards not only
in India but also overseas:
• 1963 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership .
• 1965 Padma Shri
• 1966 Padma Bhushan (from president Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan)
• 1986 Krishi Ratna Award (by the President of India)
• 1986 Wateler Peace Prize Award (of Carnegie Foundation )
• 1989 World Food Prize Laureate
• 1993 International Person of the Year (by the World Dairy Expo, Madison,
Wisconsin, USA)
• 1999 Padma Vibhushan
• 2007, Karmaveer Puraskaar Noble Laureates by iCONGO- Confederation of NGOs