Dr. Chanda Nimbkar

Dr. Chanda Nimbkar has a Ph.D. in ‘Farm animal breeding and genetics’ from the University of New England, Australia. She is the Director of the Animal Husbandry Division (AHD) of the Nimbkar Agricultural Research Institute (NARI) in Phaltan, Maharashtra. She is also a trustee and governing council member of NARI. Her team of dedicated workers has, since the early 1990s, been engaged mainly in projects for genetic improvement of local goats and sheep which are reared mainly by the poorer sections of rural society. 

From 2018, Dr. Nimbkar initiated and gave guidance to a successful systematic community-based goat breeding program in the Muzaffarpur district of Bihar for the genetic improvement of local Black Bengal goats reared by poor women with an average of only two goats owned per household. She did this together with AbacusBio, NZ under Project Mesha, funded by the BMGF and implemented by the Aga Khan Foundation, New Delhi.  An impact study of Project Mesha indicated a significant positive change in the perception of the community towards the newly introduced breeding approaches which were different from their traditional practices. The progeny of selected bucks was found to have a 25% higher average daily gain up to the age of 100 days. 

Dr. Nimbkar’s team won the 2007 award for ‘Science and Technology Innovation for Rural Development’ given by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research of the Government of India. 

Dr. Nimbkar won the ‘Illustrious Alumnus Award’ for 2011 from her college, the Ness Wadia College of Commerce in Pune, where she studied for her bachelor’s degree in commerce.

In 2023, she was featured in the book ‘Vigyan Vidushi: 75 women trailblazers of science’, published by Vigyan Prasar, an autonomous organization of the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India.

Along with research in animal genetics, Dr. Nimbkar also works as a reviewer of papers submitted to several international scientific journals.

Dr. Nimbkar has her own farm where she grows grain, fruits and trees using as few chemicals as possible and plenty of organic matter. Her favourite recreation is reading, watching movies, walking on her farm with her dogs, trekking and bird watching.  Her life partner Mr. Gavan Bromilow, an Australian, has helped her to develop her farm and farmhouse and also helps at the AHD mainly to devise new equipment and for staff capacity building.

Dr. Nimbkar has keen interest in the area of education. She consistently acknowledges commendable efforts from both students and faculty at PSS, offering invaluable insights across all organizational domains.