Pune, 30 July 2025: Dr. Umakant Dash has taken over as the new Vice-Chancellor of the Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics in Pune. Prior to this, he served as Director at the Institute of Rural Management in Gujarat and held the Reserve Bank of India Chair Professorship. He succeeded Prof. Shankar Das, who formally handed over the charge to him.
With more than 30 years of experience in teaching and research, Dr. Dash has served in prominent academic institutions in India and abroad. He headed the Humanities and Social Sciences department at IIT Madras and has also held academic positions at BITS Pilani, University of Utara Malaysia, and Tulane University in the USA.
Dr. Dash holds a Ph.D. in Applied Economics from IIT Kanpur and has completed a postgraduate diploma in Health Systems Management from Tulane University. His core areas of expertise include health economics, public policy, and development studies.
Over the years, he has published more than 90 research papers in reputed international journals like The Lancet, BMC Public Health, and the International Journal for Equity in Health. He has collaborated on research with global organizations including the World Health Organization (WHO), the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), the Rockefeller Foundation, and Access Health International.
Dr. Dash has also been part of collaborative projects with institutions in countries such as South Africa, Thailand, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Kenya, and the UK. In India, he has contributed to policy-making through committees under the Ministries of Health and Family Welfare, Cooperation, and Panchayati Raj. He also served on the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization.
He is currently a member of the academic and administrative boards of institutions such as IIT Indore, the National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (NIRDPR, Hyderabad), the Lal Bahadur Shastri Institute of Management (New Delhi), and the National Institute of Bank Management (Pune).
With his rich academic and policy background, Dr. Dash is expected to bring valuable insight and leadership to one of India’s premier research institutes based in Pune.
