Vidyarthi Vigyan Manthan: A national programme to ... - Vigyan Prasar

Verghese Kurien
Fondly called the ‘Milk Man of India’, Verghese Kurien was born on 26
November 1921 in Kozhikode, Kerala. His father was a civil surgeon in
Cochin. He graduated in physics from Loyola College, Madras in 1940
and then did BE (Mechanical) 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 MSc in Metallurgical Engineering
from Michigan State University.
Kurien is famously known as the architect of Operation Flood—
the largest dairy development programme in the world. Kurien helped
modernise the Anand model of cooperative dairy development and thus
engineered the White Revolution in India, and made India the largest
milk producer in the world. He is the founder of the Gujarat Co-operative
Milk Marketing Federation, the cooperative organisation that manages
the Amul food brand. Amul is a truly Indian brand of global standard
and involves millions of Indians. 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. Quality packed milk is now available
in more than 1,000 cities throughout the length and breadth of India.
And this is milk with a difference – pasteurised, packaged, branded, and
owned by farmers.